


New Lyoko Warriors

by Mixt



Category: Code Lyoko
Genre: Canon Compliant, Drama & Romance, Friendship, Mystery, Post-Canon, Two Years Later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-10-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:08:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 71,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25520053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mixt/pseuds/Mixt
Summary: It's now Sophomore and Junior year for the former Lyoko Warriors when seemingly out of nowhere a stray spectre attacks Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi. Now they suspect X.A.N.A. may somehow still be alive causing Jeremie to re-assemble his team with a few modifications.
Relationships: Jeremie Belpois/Aelita Schaeffer, Yumi Ishiyama/Ulrich Stern
Comments: 5
Kudos: 13





	1. He Lives

~Kadic Academy; Bordeaux, France~

15-year-old genius prodigy, Jeremie Belpois, suited in his old mahogany sweatshirt and grey pants, was sitting in Calculous class, doodling old ideas of robotic prototypes he'd axed in his notebook instead of listening to the teacher. He never needed to listen. It was calculus, much harder than the algebra class he took last semester, but he could teach the class if he wanted. Sitting next to him was a quiet girl. A girl of almost equal intellect, dressed in all pink, (and matching pink hair) also not paying much attention to the teacher. Like Jeremie, she already knew the material, not to the extent that Jeremie did, but enough to fake it if she were to get called on. This girl was, of course, Jeremie's girlfriend, Aelita Schaeffer, or as she's known by all but four people, Aelita Stones. The two hadn't changed much in the last two years except the fact that Aelita's hair had been grown out to her neck's length.

"And that covers the basics of calculus." The teacher said turning away from her chalkboard. "I know asking you to do work on the first day of class may seem taboo, but I cherish every second of class. Remember everything we talked about today, they're the building blocks you'll need for the rest of the semester." She smiled. "You are all dismissed for today."

As the various kids shuffled out of the room Jeremie slung his bag over his shoulder and quickly departed from his desk before he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked over his shoulder to see Aelita looking into his eyes.

"Are you okay, Jeremie? You didn't even correct the teacher on her mistake in her chain rule example. That's like 3rd grade math for you! You actually let Herb correct her."

Jeremie sighed. "I'm just in a bit of a funk, that's all. I'm sure it'll go away soon enough. I've just had no ideas lately. Programming, robots, computer upgrades, I can't think of a single idea for anything!"

Aelita tilted her head. "Still? Jeremie I thought you told me your inspiration came back last week when we were picking classes."

"I thought it did! But as soon as it came back, it left again."

"I'm sorry, Jeremie. Maybe meeting up with Odd and Ulrich would cheer you up. You know, I get it's the first day, but one of them might already need tutoring." She smiled. "And who better to tutor them than the smartest mind in Kadic? They're probably waiting for us at the vending machines right now."

As they walked out of the classroom Jeremie looked over at Aelita. "There's no way anyone could be behind on day one. Have you forgotten that Ulrich's actually a good student these days? And as long as Odd has him to cheat off of..."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. Ever since we beat X.A.N.A., life's been good for all of us." She said wrapping an arm around Jeremie. "Come on."

As the two approached their usual meeting place they began to vaguely make out two familiar forms ahead of them. One was easily picked out by his cone-shaped hair and the other by his trademark beige jacket. Ulrich Stern and Odd Della-Robia. Longtime friends of Jeremie and Aelita. Odd was currently inserting his money into the machine and Ulrich was just sitting on a stone next to him. Jeremie and Aelita picked up the pace to meet their two friends at the meeting spot just in time to see Odd place his plastic cup in the compartment in front of him.

"So how goes classes this year?" Aelita asked.

"Hey Princess." Ulrich said looking back her with a smile. "It's fine, I guess. Except for you know, the fact that I just entered the tenth grade and I'm already wishing I was out of school, but the dictator says it's straight to law school after this."

"Your dad's up on his high horse again?" Odd asked. "How bad is it this time?"

"Worse than ever. After Mom died, I lost that little bit of sanity I had when I was with my parents. Now it's all about what my father wants. One more crappy report card, and he's taking me straight to a new school. Worse yet he still thinks you guys are the problem, not a problem, the problem. Even though my grades are the best they've ever been." Ulrich groaned, resting his head in his hands.

"He's going to pay for your law school?"

"Yeah, but he expects me to pay him back every penny as soon as I'm a successful lawyer." Ulrich groaned.

"Have you tried telling this to him?" Aelita asked. "He can't be all bad. Maybe he just needs to meet us formally. Then we can show him how happy you are with us."

"Not possible." Jeremie said. "Odd and I already tried that a while back. We were supposed to hang out all day. Do homework, goof off, watch TV. We made it one hour before Mr. Stern had had enough of us. My dad had to come and get Odd and I. There's no way I'm letting anyone talk to you like that, Aelita."

"Aww." Odd said wiping a fake tear from his eye. "That's so cute." He looked back to the machine to find his cup still empty. "I swear to whatever deity this messed up world has-"

"There's just no talking to him. It's like he was put on this Earth to torture me." Ulrich moaned cutting off Odd.

"Speaking of torture..." Odd said interrupting Ulrich. "this machine's going to get a lot of it if it doesn't spit out my soda!" Odd said angrily. He reared his leg back then slammed it into the lower half of the machine causing it to shake vigorously in response. "If I still had my laser arrows, I'd-"

"Della-Robia!" A voice boomed. The four sophomores turned their heads to find a large, brunette man clad in a red jumpsuit and grey sweatpants standing over them. Jim Morales. "That vending machine is school property! That's two hours detention and if I catch you manhandling it one more time, it's straight to Mr. Delmas's office with you!" He turned his head to Jeremie. "Belpois! I'm counting on you to keep your friends here, in line! Can you do that for me?" Jeremie nodded once in silence. Jim looked to Aelita. "What's his problem?"

"He's just in a bit of a low point right now." Aelita said. "He's out of steam."

"Huh." Jim said. "Reminds me of when I used to be a therapist for teenagers." He said smiling before shaking his head. "But before you ask-"

"You'd rather not talk about it?" Aelita guessed.

"Right. But how'd you know?"

"Lucky guess." Aelita shrugged. "No chance it could happen twice." She smirked.

"Right you are. I am not a predictable man." Jim said proudly. "Well, since Belpois is having troubles and he speaks so highly of you Stones, I'm counting on you to keep Della-Robia and Stern in line."

"Me?!" Ulrich said hitching a thumb towards himself. "It was Odd who kicked the stupid machine! I've just been sitting here!" He protested.

"Oh, yeah!" Odd shot back. "Throw your best buddy under the bus, real classy Ulrich!" Odd said.

"He already saw you! I couldn't throw you under the bus even if I wanted too." Ulrich growled.

"No backtalk Stern, or you'll join Della-Robia in detention!" Jim snapped.

"I'll do my best Jim. But for now, I have to take Jeremie back to his room." Aelita said. Jim nodded and made left to return to his gym. "Ulrich, Odd, we'll meet up in an hour for lunch, okay?"

"Yeah, sure" Ulrich replied. "We're gonna stay here and wait for Yumi. She should be showing up here soon. Our first lunch together of another year." Ulrich said happily.

"See you guys." Jeremie waved. The two made their way to the double doors leading to the boy's dorms. A quiet walk ended when Jeremie reached for the door, only to have it opened from the other side. As the door opened a shaggy black-haired boy, in a beige jacket was revealed on the other side. He looked up slowly. "Jeremie? Aelita?" The boy said instantly lighting up his face.

"Hey, William. How was your summer?" Aelita asked sweetly. "Any special family you got to see?"

William shook his head. "No, just me and the folks. As for the quality, I wanted to talk to you two. Are the others there?"

"No." Jeremie said. "But I can go grab the quick if you-"

"No!" William said jolting slightly. At the concerning glares he was getting from the two geniuses, he sighed. "Look, I'm getting bad vibes from Ulrich lately. I think he's still holding a grudge, I'd rather just talk to you two. I have a question. Are you sure X.A.N.A.'s dead?"

"What makes you bring that up?" Jeremie asked. "We told you that we shut it down after the multi-agent program successfully destroyed him. We haven't had any troubles for a whole year."

"Nightmares." William said. "Nightmares every night specifically of X.A.N.A. returning stronger than ever. He traps more innocent people in Lyoko. He throws all of us into the digital sea. He escaped the supercomputer again. They're so real." He said shivering slightly. "I haven't had these nightmares since X.A.N.A. was supposedly killed. Nightmares might not even describe it. If say I was hit in the chest, I'll feel it when I wake up."

Jeremy pushed up his glasses. He nodded a couple times catching William's attention. "A classic case of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder." He said calmly. "You were forced to do X.A.N.A.'s bidding for months without rest. It's only natural that this kind of thing happens. It's happened to Aelita and I, too. See if you can get yourself some medication. Sertraline, Fluoxetine, that kinda stuff."

"If you're sure. But in order to get medication, wouldn't I have to tell them what the incident that caused it was? I'd either out you guys, or be thrown straight to the looney bin."

Jeremy sighed. "Well, I've forged birth certificates and medical records before, so I guess a prescription wouldn't be impossible." He said ruffling his hair. "It'll give me something to do again, even if I am going back to being a criminal." Jeremie said half happily. "And I'm already a felon, so what do have to lose?"

"Thanks guys." William said. "I'll make it up to you somehow."

"You don't need to do that, William. We're friends." Aelita said. "We don't need to keep score."

"Friends?" William asked tilting his head. "But I-"

"What? Ya think I'd be doing this for you if I hated you?" Jeremie joked.

"Thank you. I really appreciate this." William smiled. "One last thing. Promise me, if you see or hear anything suspicious, you'll let me know. Those nightmares, they're so terrible, I just can't imagine my brain making those kinds of things up."

"We haven't heard of anything suspicious in so long." Aelita said. "If X.A.N.A. were alive he wouldn't hesitate to attack our world again." She added. "But If for whatever reason something strange comes up, you'll know."

"Thanks, guys. You're the best. I've got a class in ten, Delmas'll kill me if I'm late on the first day again, but maybe I'll see you guys around?"

"Of course." Jeremie said. "You know where my dorm is if you have any more troubles." William nodded and bolted out the door. Jeremie and Aelita continued through the doors and up the stairs. And straight to Jeremie's room.

"William seemed so much sadder than usual, no?" Aelita said sitting down on Jeremie's bed as the boy genius too his spot at his computer. "You had to have noticed it."

"Yeah. And I don't think it was just his fears of X.A.N.A." Jeremie said. "I think he misses having the five of us around. You saw the way he lit up when he saw us. Maybe we should have invited him to the lunch table. You know, reconnect with him."

"I think we should have too, but Yumi and Ulrich probably wouldn't like that so much." She added laying back onto the bed. "I don't want to exclude him, but I don't want to upset the others either."

"Well either way we upset someone so I say we choose what would best sits with us." Jeremie said. "I'm going to get started on getting William those medications."

"Oh, I'll help." Aelita said getting up. "Two sets of eyes are better than one." She said happily.

Back at the vending machine Ulrich and Odd both stood leaning up against the vending machine drinking their respective sodas. "So, Ulrich, how are things with you and Yumi?"

"Man, you really have a thing for my personal relationships." Ulrich groaned. "Look, if I tell you, will you find someone else's romantic life to constantly inquire about?" He said.

"That hurts, Ulrich." Odd said feigning a broken heart. "You know I only want what's best for you. I just want to make sure you're okay."

"Yumi is what's best for me." Ulrich said. "I know you're just trying to get under my skin, because there's no way you're doubting Yumi."

"Well she did organize a ploy to get rid of my precious Tamagutchi Jean-Pierre." Odd said with a fake resentful face. "And then she overreacted about that whole school newspaper photo incident."

"You were getting seriously addicted to that stupid piece of plastic, and you brought that second scenario on to yourself and dragged me into it so don't start complaining to me." Ulrich said. "Hey there's Yumi." Ulrich said pointing past the jokester and towards a tall, thin, Japanese girl in all black walking towards them.

"Ulrich! Odd!" She waved. She came to a stop in front of the two boys. "It's good to see you guys again. How was your Summer, Odd? You know, over in Italy?"

"Oh, it was great." He said sarcastically. "If by great, you mean being bullied by your five older sisters cause they think you're a lazy shrimp who's never done anything significant, despite the fact that I've saved the world from an evil computer virus, then yeah it was amazing." He huffed.

"Oh, come on they can't be that bad. Hiroki's annoying but I wouldn't trade him for the world. Say is Kiwi here?" Yumi asked.

"No. Those sisters that 'can't be that bad', Louise and Marie, told on me as I was loading him into his favorite bag with his snacks. Adele promised to take good care of him while I'm at school. I'm telling you they're the worst."

"Oh." Yumi said. "I take it back. I might actually miss the little mutt." She said sadly. "I can't believe he's actually not going to be here. It's a first."

"Louise said I could face time with him once a week-" Odd added.

"So at least they have some good qualities." Yumi noted.

"-in exchange for my entire secret candy stash I've been building up for years. Every. Last. Piece. I couldn't even get a daily face time." Odd slumped. "Let's just talk about something else. I miss him enough already."

"Maybe buying a lady a drink will make you feel better." Yumi said. "You know what I mean?"

"Thanks, but I already tried. Heidi didn't want to see me. She's still mad about the whole 'two girls' thing." Odd said sadly.

"One," Ulrich said gaining his full footing and reaching into his pocket. "Yumi meant you should buy her a drink." He informed him pulling out a coin. He quickly inserted one euro into the machine and mashed the button showcasing Yumi's favorite drink. "Two, what made you think she'd forgiven you? Things like that sting, Odd." By now the machine had dispensed a plastic cup but no fluids had come out. "What the-" He said hitting the button a second time. "Is this broken again?!"

Before Ulrich could say anymore, from the small dispenser came a slightly larger puff of black smoke. For a millisecond it just scanned the area. It eventually landed its sights on Ulrich. The little smoke shot forward with great speed and within just a blink, climbed Ulrich's body and entered his body through his open mouth.

Ulrich's eyelids shot open as fast and as wide as they could as he fell over flat with his back to the ground. He could very, very, faintly hear his name being called. He started screaming loudly, drowning out the faint sounds, and rolling around onto his side, then back to flat, then to his other side, then back to being flat, repeating this pattern as quickly as his body would let him, all the while his skin was variating from pale to a blackened pale.

"Ulrich!" Yumi called. "What's going on, Ulrich?!"

Ulrich's mind flashed several scenes into his view. He first saw the time X.A.N.A. created a virus to steal his memories of his friends and excommunicate him from his group, then it switched to Ulrich being shot in the back by a materialized Krab, in an attempt to protect Hiroki, knocking his smoking body down onto the street. The final vision showed had Ulrich staying out in the subzero cold with Yumi, who was under a tree, as she began dying, with no phone to call for help. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

"Ulrich, talk to me!" Yumi begged with Odd standing over her and Ulrich. She looked up to Odd. "Go get Nurse Yolanda!"

The small black puff quickly exited Ulrich's mouth and darted to Yumi. Too fast for the human eye, the puff entered Yumi's body through her left ear. Yumi stumbled backwards, falling onto her backside, with both hands wrapped around her head. Her face cringed in pain as she slowly laid back on the ground. Making many audible reactionary noises. Like Ulrich, her skin was fluctuating in its hue constantly.

"I'm coming, Yumi!" Odd called, stepping over Ulrich's body and kneeling to grab Yumi.

Yumi's mind was going all out in showing her darkest side of her time fighting X.A.N.A. She could see herself falling, falling straight into the digital sea. She could see Aelita giving up her spot just to bring Yumi back. She could see herself inside a boiling hot room, with Ulrich, boiling alive. She could also see herself on a roof huddling her little brother Hiroki and his friends Johnny as a giant meteor hurdled towards them. The last scene she saw was herself all alone in a pod amidst the world wide net with no weapons and no power. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

Ulrich moaned lightly as his eyes fluttered open. He grabbed his head with one hand and pried himself up in an attempt to regain his senses. He looked over to see Odd panicking over a, what appeared to be, epileptic Yumi. "Odd? What's wrong with Yumi?!" He yelled getting back to his feet.

"Ulrich!" Odd called. "You're up! Great, now help me with Yumi! After you fell over, she fell, too!" He yelled. "We gotta get her to Nurse Yolanda! We were gonna take you, but now-"

The black puff exited Yumi's body through her right ear, floating up higher into the air in front of the two boys. Under it, Yumi stopped with her violent noises and lay perfectly stationary. Instead of moving too fast for Ulrich and Odd to see, it remained in place long enough for the two boys to recognize its presence and analyze it as it bobbed up and down.

"Doesn't that look like-" Odd started.

"Shut up, Odd." Ulrich jabbed. "He's dead, remember?"

The little puff shot forward towards Odd. Before the joker could react, the little puff cloud entered Odd's right nostril and immediately started its assault. Odd shook for a moment as his skin grew a light grey before falling onto his knees and catching himself by outstretching his arms and landing on his hands. His body began shaking in a very violent vibration.

Yumi jolted up, immediately coming to her senses to find Ulrich awake and kneeling in front of Odd snapping his fingers to invoke a response. Odd, meanwhile, was in relatively the same situation Ulrich was in before the lapse in her memory. "Ulrich, You're up? Odd!"

"I'm just glad you're up and not changing colors anymore, because Odd's not responding and I have no clue what I'm doing!" Ulrich yelled.

Odd's mind had already begun the terrible slideshow. At the moment he could see a zombified version of himself attacking his best buddy Ulrich. He vaguely remembered Ulrich mentioning that at some point in their relationship. He could see himself locked in a deep gorge quickly filling up with water, it switched to the pit being completely filled and Odd being submerged underwater. Then next scene playing out in his head was him attacking Jim at a school play in a blur of dementia and insanity. It continued with his worst X.A.N.A. memory. He was on top of his roof, with both of his parents urging that he and Sissi be thrown off. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

Its job finished, the puff flew out Odd's right nostril and zipped off into the sky, growing in size as it flew away. Left behind was Odd, still on his hands and knees and panting heavily.

"Odd!" Yumi and Ulrich called. Ulrich wrapped Odd's left arm around his shoulder and Yumi mimicked his movements on the right, both lifting the boy to his feet.

"I just had the craziest flashbacks. I saw myself in all different types of deadly situations." Odd explained resting a hand on his head. "Forget the nurse, we gotta call Einstein." Odd said.

"Why? Nurse Yolanda would have a much better chance at explaining what's going on." Yumi said.

"You didn't see it." Odd said. "It's X.A.N.A. I don't know how, but we saw him. I'd know that smoke anywhere." He said finally catching his breath. "We need to talk with Einstein."

"Are you sure Odd? I mean, don't take this the wrong way, but you loved being a hero...even if you were never recognized as one. Maybe you're just imagining things." Yumi said. "Ulrich talk some sense into him." Yumi asked.

"You saw X.A.N.A. attacks too, didn't you?" Ulrich asked the girl. "You can find Yolanda if you want but Odd and I are going to get Jeremie. If there's even the slightest chance he survived, they need to know."

"Fine. You're right." Yumi admitted. "It's just...we won. The program worked. Why can't we just live in peace? Be normal?"

"I don't know Yumi." Ulrich said sadly. "But we can't just ignore this, we have to be sure."

"Yeah, Einstein?" Odd asked into his phone. His head tilted slightly after a moment. "Oh, sorry Princess. Listen we need to talk, somewhere no one would ever hear." He said. "No, your dorm's too accessible. Meet us at the place. You know where." With that he closed his flip phone and pocketed the machine. "Let's go, lovebirds." He ordered.

"Where to?" Ulrich asked.

Odd turned around and smirked. "Memory Lane." Odd said slyly.

~Abandoned Factory~

As Jeremie and Aelita descended within the abandoned factory's elevator the two looked very displeased. Aelita could barely hear Jeremie's ranting over the screeching of the old machinery. "I mean, seriously, why can't we just talk in our rooms like regular people?!" Jeremie ranted. "This better not be another one of Odd's jokes."

"Maybe we can't be like regular people because we aren't regular people. I'm a human who was formerly a computer program who was formerly a human, and you've got enough brains to win a Nobel Prize at age 15." Aelita quipped. "Just try and enjoy the ride next time." The doors loudly unlocked and slowly slid open to reveal a large, mostly empty, room with a giant supercomputer in the center and a small ladder off to the sides. Gathered around the supercomputer was Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich. That didn't bother the geniuses though, what bothered them was that the supercomputer was glowing.

"What's going on?!" Jeremie called. "What did you do?!" He questioned running for the computer.

"We didn't do anything!" Odd shot back.

"You turned on the supercomputer!" Jeremie hissed. "Rule number one was: leave the computer off!"

"Easy, Jeremie, we didn't turn it on." Yumi interjected. "It was on when we got here. We're just as confused as you are. Only difference is, we can't figure out how it happened. That's your job."

"But first we need to talk." Ulrich said. "We have reason to believe X.A.N.A. is alive and kicking." He said. "The three of us were attacked by a cloud of black smoke that showed us our worst times with X.A.N.A."

"Black smoke?" Aelita inquired. "A specter?"

"We think so. It definitely wasn't friendly. It felt just like when X.A.N.A. tried possessing me for the first time."

"No." Aelita gasped. "X.A.N.A. can't be alive. What about Daddy's sacrifice?"

"All for naught, it seems." Ulrich said sadly. "I know what I saw."

"Impossible." Jeremy said, quickly dismissing them. "The multi-agent program was a complete success. We checked remember? X.A.N.A.'s dead." He said taking his place at the chair. "Now let's see why our old friend here is awake." He began typing as Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich closed the gap around him.

"There has to be something!" Odd argued. "A loophole, a malfunction, anything!"

At Odd's comment Jeremie halted his work. He readjusted his glasses before looking down. "There is one way. And only one way. But it's impossible." He paused to scratch his chin. "The only way for X.A.N.A. to have returned is if someone data-mined into the deepest pits of memory in the supercomputer and retrieved the most basic components of his code left scattered behind from X.A.N.A.'s destruction. Theoretically someone could've pieced him back together and revived him that way and because they would have only been able to retrieve the building blocks, it explains why it took so long for X.A.N.A. to return. But no one knows about this place other than us."

"And William." Yumi added. "He could've turned it on and revived X.A.N.A." She guessed. "We haven't really spoken in a year, giving him plenty of time to slip past us."

"He wouldn't." Odd said. "Sure, we didn't treat him the best, but we apologized for that! He wouldn't unleash X.A.N.A. back into the world just because he was mad!"

"Okay." Jeremie said leaning back in his chair. "Let's pretend for a second that William is a suspect. What's his angle here?" Jeremie asked. "He hates X.A.N.A. maybe even more than you do. What could he gain from releasing the virus that nearly took his life away?"

"Maybe he didn't have a choice." Ulrich said. "Maybe he still has some residue of X.A.N.A. inside his brain from when he served him. Like a sleeper agent." Ulrich suggested.

"Nope. We did a full anatomical scan the day we got him back. Not a spec of X.A.N.A.'s code in him." Aelita argued.

"Okay, so it wasn't William." Yumi summed. "That means someone has been down here recently and that means...someone at Kadic knows about the factory and X.A.N.A." She said.

"Even worse, they're our enemy now." Ulrich added. "What'll we do with them when we find them. We can't just erase them with a computer program."

"Oh, come on." Odd interrupted. "You don't believe it was someone here at Kadic is actually out to get us, do you?" Odd asked. "Who? Herb and Nicholas?!" He chuckled to himself.

"How else do you explain the sudden return of X.A.N.A.?" Ulrich asked. "And the supercomputer being on? You think it was a ghost?"

"Maybe." Odd retorted. "We're fighting a super-intelligent computer program bent on the destruction of the human race and you think ghosts are farfetched?"

"Now hold on." Aelita interrupted. "You all are making big assumptions, here. We haven't checked the computer. X.A.N.A. may be dead. You three could've simultaneously hallucinated these scenes. Unlikely, but not impossible."

"Aelita's right. I'll scan the supercomputer for any signs of X.A.N.A. Yumi, Odd, Ulrich, you guys go down and check on the scanners. If John Doe turned on the supercomputer, maybe they did something with the scanners too." Jeremie said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small earpiece. "Here, Yumi." He said tossing the piece of technology to the girl who held out her hands. "Put it on, and relay whatever you find down there to me."

As Yumi stepped into the Elevator between Odd and Ulrich, she adjusted the earpiece into her left here and gave a thumbs up. "Got it." She said as the doors closed in front of her.

With the three gone, Aelita turned to Jeremie who was already at work with the keyboard. "They have to be seeing things, right?" Aelita asked. Her heart and mind were telling her two different things, her heart said X.A.N.A. was dead and gone, thanks to her father, but her mind wasn't so convinced.

Jeremie sighed. "Honestly, all three of them having the same vision at the same time, black smoke, the supercomputer being on, it's not looking good." He said continuing to type. "I'm launching a system-wide scan... now!" He pushed down on the enter key with his index finger and leaned back once more. "If X.A.N.A. is alive, we'll know in a few moments."

'Jeremie.' Yumi's voice called into Jeremie's ear.

Jeremie put a finger to the communication device. "Yumi. What's up with the scanners?" The genius asked.

Below the computer room, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi had split up to each examine one scanner. Odd was standing inside the first scanned looking up. Ulrich was on his knee examining the ground around the second scanner. Finally, Yumi was on all fours checking the wires connected to the back of the third scanner.

"The wires connected to scanner three are warm." Yumi reported. "It's been used recently, like 'in the last 24 hours' recently." She said getting to her feet. She looked over to Odd who was playing on his phone, presumably because he didn't find anything.

"Hey, Yumi!" Ulrich called. "Take a look at this." Yumi nodded and went to Ulrich who held a hand out in front of him, presenting a small, blue, pill shaped item to Yumi. Yumi looked back at the boy and shrugged. "It's candy." Ulrich informed her.

"So? That's nothing to go off of. Odd used all three of these scanners for years." Yumi argued. "With his loose pockets, I'd bet there's candy all over this place."

"You think?" Ulrich smirked. He tossed the piece of candy to Odd who caught it eagerly.

Odd threw the candy up in the air and caught with his open mouth. Yumi cringed slightly as he chewed the single pellet. As he kept chewing, he began smiling. "This candy is not years old." Odd said. "It should have gotten at least a little stale. Nope, that was from a recently opened package." He continued chewing. "Opened approximately one week ago." He said before swallowing the piece hard. "Scanner two has been used recently, too."

"Odd and Ulrich think scanner two's been used recently as well." Yumi reported to Jeremie.

'On what grounds?' Jeremie asked through the comm.

"It's totally ridiculous. They found a piece of candy, Odd ate it, and just like that-" Yumi started.

'Say no more.' Jeremie ordered. 'Odd's patented Candy Taste Test. It's been tested more than I care to mention. If he says it was recent, then it was. Thanks for checking, you guys can come back up now.'

Yumi pulled out the earpiece and pocketed it. Before gesturing her arm forward. "Works done here boys, back upstairs." She ordered.

The three teens loaded into the elevator and as soon as the doors close, immediately felt themselves going up. "If X.A.N.A. really is back, I don't-"

"Ulrich." Yumi interrupted as the doors began to open. "I swear if you jinx us, I will give you a swift kick..." She started turning her head back to Jeremie and Aelita. "...to...the..." She slurred as she took in the scene in front of her. She could see Jeremie and Aelita hugging each other tightly where Aelita once stood alone, she could hear Aelita crying, but what bothered her the most was the computer screen flashing a single image, one she knew too well. X.A.N.A.'s signature. "No." Yumi said softly.

Ulrich grabbed Yumi's shoulder causing her to turn around and hug him. He just continued to glare at the screen showing that cursed eye. "No more normality for us." He said.

"You gonna be okay, Princess?" Odd asked approaching the two.

After the two separated, Aelita sniffled and wiped a tear away. "I'll live...hopefully." She said. "But if X.A.N.A.'s alive, then what did my father die for?"

"He died so we could live." Jeremie said. "And now we have to honor that sacrifice once again. I won't force you three into anything but Aelita and I are going to fight. I know things have changed for you guys so it's totally up to you."

"I'm in." Odd said. "You'll get yourselves killed if it's just the two of you." He smirked.

"I'm in, too." Ulrich said. "Nobody else can do what we do. We need to be the protectors."

"What about your dad?" Aelita asked. "One more terrible report card, which is bound to happen if we're fighting X.A.N.A., and he'll drag you straight out of here."

"Screw him." Ulrich said vindictively. "You guys are my best friends. Your fights are my fights. So, if you're fighting to save the world, then so am I."

"Well, I definitely can't back out after Ulrich goes and says somethin' like that, can I?" Yumi said trying to make light of the situation. "Alright, then. I'll fight, too. But only cause it's you guys."

"Looks like the Lyoko Warriors are back in business," Jeremie said. "whether we like it or not. Back to our secretive ways."

"Double time, now that we suspect somebody at Kadic to be working for X.A.N.A." Aelita added.

"What difference does being secretive it make with that?" Ulrich shrugged. "As soon as we start to fight back, whoever's working for X.A.N.A. will know we're back. They'll have no trouble finding us either."

"What do we know so far?" Odd asked. "Did you find anything interesting in the computer scan?" He asked turning to the resident genius.

Jeremie let go of Aelita and climbed back into his computer chair. He began typing and nodded once. "Yeah, and I would've held out hope that it was just a glitch if you guys hadn't told me about the scanners." He said. "You guys remember the heart of Lyoko, right?" Jeremie asked. As he spoke the screen lit up with a spherical blueprint with three different dots located around it. One black and two red. "That," Jeremie said pointing to the larger black dot. "Is X.A.N.A." He told them.

"So who're his buddies?" Yumi asked.

"That's the bad part, they're people." He said as the screen zoomed in on one of the red dots. Once it came into view the red faded away to show a double-helix underneath. "See?"

"Oh cool! It's the spiral ladder from biology! What did Ms. Hertz call it?" He said tapping his forehead.

"Deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA." Jeremie said rolling his eyes, though at this point he should be expecting these kinds of remarks. "You'd think you would remember after all the times Hertz yelled your ear off for calling it a ladder instead of DNA." In response, Odd just shrugged and waited for Jeremie to continue. "Not just any DNA, it's human DNA. Whoever was here, virtualized two people onto Lyoko, and now..."

"They're prisoners of X.A.N.A." Aelita finished. "Just like William was."

"But why?" Yumi asked taking a step closer to the supercomputer. "If X.A.N.A. wanted to capture someone, why not strike us? Or William?"

"Because we know how to fight him. We know Lyoko like the back of our hands." Ulrich pointed out. "But that still doesn't explain why he wanted to capture anyone in the first place."

"It's simple evil battle strategy." Jeremie told them. "The best bet to destroy X.A.N.A. would've been to attack the core and destroy Lyoko altogether, killing X.A.N.A. instantly. But now with those innocent lives, it's a much more difficult call to make. If we destroy Lyoko without finding those two, they'll die with X.A.N.A. He's buying himself time. Wait..."

"What?" Aelita asked.

"Somethings happening." Jeremie said. The screen zoomed out of the dot and reverted back to its previous state. Except now the red dots had two separate streams of green light drawing from them and into the black dot. "X.A.N.A.'s taking something from them."

"What?" Yumi asked. "What could complete strangers have that he wants?"

"I don't know." Jeremie said honestly. "I'd have to do a scan on it like I did with the dots." Just then, the green streams disappeared gradually leaving the three dots behind once again. "And there goes my chance."

"Wait!" Ulrich said. "Was X.A.N.A.'s dot always that big?" He asked pointing to the black dot.

"No." Aelita confirmed. "Jeremie," She said turning to the blonde. "Do a scan on X.A.N.A. again, I have a theory."

"As you wish." Jeremie said. A green box isolated the dot and tinted everything inside it green too. "Examine is underway, should be done right about... now." On cue, several lines appeared pointing to several parts of the sphere representing X.A.N.A.

"I knew it!" Aelita said. "Look at his functioning capacity!" She said pointing to one of the stats. "Do you see it?"

"One hundred and two percent." Odd read. "So what?"

"Odd, X.A.N.A.'s a program. A hyper-intelligent, evil, government program, but a program nonetheless. It should only have a top functioning capacity of one hundred percent." Jeremie said. "Somehow, X.A.N.A. is able to override its original programming and go beyond his base capabilities."

"And the higher the functioning capacity, the bigger the threat he's going to be?" Yumi guessed.

"Sadly, that's right." Jeremie said. "And that's what he was stealing from those people, power."

"How does that work?" Ulrich asked.

"It's actually a very simple answer." Jeremie told him. "The human body is filled with electricity. X.A.N.A. must be harvesting that from them. It won't harm the hostages, but it could certainly harm our cause."

"But X.A.N.A. couldn't have done this on his own. Programs don't just grow the capabilities to defy their programming. Someone had to have helped him." Aelita added. "And it's probably the same person who's running around in the factory while we're not here."

"I'll get working on a security system for the factory. Nothing fancy, just enough to find out who's been here and hopefully scare whoever it is off the premises." Jeremie said. "It'll take some time, so for the time being, we need to be extra careful."

"Sorry, Einstein." Ulrich said. "We got gym class with Jim. Remember the new rule Kadic introduced this year? Any unexplained absence on the first day of classes will result in an automatic fail of the class they missed."

"You're going to have to get out of your chair and show Jim the Olympic athlete we all know you are on the inside!" Odd joked.

"Damn." Jeremie cursed. "Alright. Everyone meet me in my dorm later this evening."

~Jeremie's dorm~

Jeremie sat in his usual spot, in front of his dorm PC, typing away on his keyboard. To his left sat his pink-haired assistant, perched on top of the table, hanging her legs out in front of her. Jeremie stopped typing and pushed his keyboard forward and swung his swivel chair around to face the pinkette. "Now that we've scanned the super-computer, our worst fears are realized. X.A.N.A.'s back and stronger than ever." Jeremie said putting his hand to his chin. "The only question is, how do we combat him this time?"

"With him already stronger than he was before, we'll have to try and limit our returns to the past even more." Aelita said. "And I don't even know if that's possible. Without erasing memories, people will start to catch on and then..."

"Yeah, bad news." Jeremie agreed. "And then there are the hostages. Who knows what kind of torture they're going through right now? But I think I might have a solution, so let's wait until the gang gets here. They should be arriving any minute now."

Aelita sighed. "Is all this really worth it?" She asked.

"What do you mean?" Jeremie asked tilting his head. "Of course, it's worth it. You'll see, you're going to be so happy when we find Franz."

Aelita jumped off the table onto the floor and turned towards him. "Don't get me wrong, I would give anything for my father...well almost anything. Once again you guys are going to risk your lives just to make me happier. We don't even know if my father really is alive, only that it's possible."

Jeremie stood up slowly and took Aelita's hands in his. "Are you kidding? We owe everything to you. If I hadn't met you the day I turned on the supercomputer we wouldn't have met. I wouldn't have gone to Ulrich and Odd for help. Ulrich wouldn't have involved Yumi and then where would our group be? Nowhere. And me, I'd still be a hermit with no friends." He smiled. "Maybe you never realized this but you brought us together. We're friends because of you. Not to mention thank to your soundboard skills, I'm totally dating a techno-pop star!"

"Thank you Jeremie." She said squeezing his hands. "I feel like I owe everything to you guys to, you especially. Yumi, Odd, Ulrich, they're my family, they all accepted me and my naivety so quickly, but you? You turned the supercomputer back on. You materialized me and went as far as forging government documents just to have me in school with you. You spent day after day slaving over your computer to free me from the virus you thought I had, and most importantly you reminded me of my humanity, my family." She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his. Jeremie was so happy that his whole surroundings melted away. That is, until reality brought him back.

"Are we interrupting?" A familiar female voice said. Jeremie and Aelita and Jeremie turned to find Yumi, Odd and Ulrich had entered the room, joining the two. "We can give you two a couple minutes."

Beside her Odd nodded. "You know, you two are cute and all, but if you're going to do that you might want to lock the door. Never know when Milly and Tamiya might come looking for a scoop, then boom! You're front page of Kadic news! I don't know if Mr. and Mrs. Einstein could handle that kind of attention." Odd said laughing to himself.

"Leave them alone Odd." Yumi said kicking Odd softly. "Love is just something you don't understand."

"If you two are done," Jeremie said sitting back down in his swivel chair. "we have some business to discuss. Regarding you-know-who." Jeremie ordered. "We just need William."

"William?!" Yumi exclaimed. "No way. I like the guy, but if X.A.N.A. really is back we can't afford to give him his old pawn back. It's too risky, for us and for William."

"I'm with Yumi. He's too undisciplined." Ulrich said. "After all the trouble he caused us last time, I don't think we should let him back in."

"He didn't cause us any trouble; in fact, I remember him saving both our lives from a bomb. He got cocky, yeah, but it was X.A.N.A who made him do all those terrible things. And you saw what a powerhouse he was on Lyoko, we need him." Odd interjected. "Maybe you just don't want the competition for-"

"If you try and finish that thought, you'll finish it with a fist in your face." Ulrich threatened. "Don't make this about me, this is about WIlliam."

"Odd is right, though." Aelita said. "We need more firepower, and William is a good warrior if nothing else."

"And on top of being right, as always, we need to consider how dangerous it is to exclude him." Odd pointed out. "He knows everything."

"More importantly," Aelita interjected. "He's a friend. He was a prisoner of .A.'s for months. If anyone deserves to know what's happening, it's him. And I'm prepared to give him a chance to redeem himself." She said crossing her arms.

"I still say no." Ulrich said. "What if your second chance backfires? We'll be in even worse trouble."

"I had a feeling you'd say that." Aelita said smirking she reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone presenting it to them with one hand and waggling it back and forth. "That's why I already invited him. He knows everything about X.A.N.A.'s return." She said.

"What?!" Yumi exclaimed. "Jeremie, did you know about this?"

"I'm not Aelita's keeper. She's free to do whatever she wants. She doesn't need my permission to make a phone call." He swung around to face Ulrich, Yumi, and Odd. "Now we take a vote. William or no William. Raise your hands for keeping William on the outside." Jeremie said. Ulrich and Yumi both immediately raised their hands into the air.

"I." Yumi said.

"I." Ulrich echoed.

Jeremie looked around the room to see Aelita leaning back on his table with her arms crossed and Odd lying flat on his back looking at the ceiling. "That's two for and three opposed. Majority rules that William becomes a warrior once more."

"Interesting. So, this wasn't a joke." The door slowly slid all the way open revealing William standing in the doorway. He strode into the room and took his place on the bed. "And Ulrich and Yumi don't want me here." He said eyeing the two.

"Were you eavesdropping this whole time?" Jeremie asked slightly annoyed.

"Told you. Lock the door next time." Odd quipped not even looking back at Jeremie.

"William it's not like that." Yumi said rubbing the back of his head. "It's just...last time...well..."

"No. Stop." William said putting both hands in front of him signaling Yumi to stop talking. "I'd like to say something; I'm not the one to blame for everything I did. X.A.N.A. was controlling me, yet you still hold it against me. Do you know what it's like to lose 4 months of your life? And then you come back and the closest things you have to friends shut you out. Only Aelita would dare talk to me. Jeremie hadn't said a word to me either until a just a bit ago. And the three of you? Nothing. And if that's not bad enough, no one else wants me around anymore. They all miss 'Comedian William'." He said with distain. "It's not fair."

"William," Yumi said. "We didn't know it meant that much to you."

"Of course, you had no idea." William shot back. "You couldn't have known seeing as you were too busy pretending I never existed. A simple 'hey, William, how's it going?' would've made my day. But you couldn't even bother to go that far." William sighed. "I get that I did a lot of terrible things during my time as a puppet that made you lose your trust in me. That I can understand, but to act like we're not even friends afterwards?" He looked up at the two who voted against him. "That's colder than anything X.A.N.A. did to me."

"Hey, don't blame this on us!" Ulrich shot back. "We treated you like that for the good of the group. You've been nothing but trouble from the day you joined us. Do you know how many times you almost helped X.A.N.A. win?!"

"I didn't ask to be a puppet!" William argued. "X.A.N.A. took advantage of me and made me his little slave. That's not my fault!"

"You should have listened to Aelita! Who doesn't listen to the girl that spent an entire decade in that infernal place?!" Ulrich said.

"I let my cockiness get the better of me! Sorry I couldn't be the flawless hero you wanted! I didn't have years of training. I wasn't aware of just how strong X.A.N.A. was. So yeah, I got caught, that doesn't mean I'm not worthy to be here!"

"Maybe not to you, but we can't afford any more screwups! X.A.N.A.'s already got two prisoners and we can't afford to give him any more power!" Ulrich replied. "This isn't about your feelings, we're trying to save the world here."

"I'm not going anywhere. As long as X.A.N.A. lives, I have just as much of a right to be here as the rest of you. This time, no loose cannon, I'll follow your orders to a T. Once he's destroyed for good, if you guys still don't trust me, you can go back to ignoring me." He said looking at Jeremie.

"Jeremie, think about this." Ulrich said turning to Jeremie. "You're supposed to be the smart one! A risk like this? We can't do it!"

"We took a vote, and the vote says we keep William. But I'll meet you halfway. Willaim will officially begin his trial period. It gives us time to truly evaluate whether we're making the right choice. At any point we can take another vote and if at any point, majority rules negative, William's out. Deal?"

Ulrich and William shared a glance before nodding once at the genius. "Fine." Ulrich said.

"Well now that we're all caught up. I have an idea for a technique for fighting X.A.N.A." Jeremie said. "And it's not new to us either. X.A.N.A.'s stronger than when we last clashed, so I figured we needed more power as well. We've already got William, but we still need more." Jeremie said.

"No." Yumi said. "You can't be suggesting-" She started shaking her head.

Aelita nodded. "We need more Lyoko Warriors." Aelita said. "I agree with Jeremie on this. The five of us always had trouble being at the factory at the same time and I feel like six will go no better. We need people who can keep our secret, are capable of fighting or learning to fight, and won't create any tension within our group. Most importantly, we need people who can follow orders. If we had stressed that more last time..." Aelita paused before she could finish her sentence.

"Then I wouldn't have been a virtual prisoner for months." William finished. "You can bring it up, we all know it happened."

"Why not recruit the whole student body?!" Odd said getting up. "Even if we're stuck in class, there's gotta be tons of students with nothing to do but homework so there'll always be someone available."

"Odd out of all your pea-brained ideas," Jeremie said pinching the bridge of his nose. "that was the worst. First of all, it only takes one loud mouth to blow the whole operation and I can think of ten students right off the bat who couldn't keep a secret to save the world. Secondly if the entire school's grades go down at once Jim and Delmas wouldn't stop until they found out what was going on."

"So, who would you suggest?" Odd asked. "The new chick, Laura Gauthier? She's like a second Mrs. Einstein. And not too bad a looker either." Odd joked before getting silenced after being hit in the face with a pencil case. "Hey!" He said wiping the plastic case off of his face. "Why'd you-"

"There is only one Mrs. Einstein." Aelita growled. "Absolutely not."

"Ooh, who knew the princess had a jealous side?" Odd chuckled. "This is news."

"Getting back on topic," Jeremie said. "My suggestion would be Patrick." He smirked.

"Your cousin?" Aelita asked raising her eyebrow. "But he doesn't even go to Kadic. How could he be of any help?"

"Actually, we've become rather close over the holidays and I thought it might be fun to have him around, so I convinced his parents to give good ol' Kadic another chance. I didn't know about X.A.N.A. then, but it works out. He knows Aikido, so he's already a potentially skilled fighter."

"Isn't Aikido all about self-defense and not fighting?" Odd said. "You can't just block an attack from a mega-tank. You need a killer instinct or X.A.N.A. will destroy you."

"Don't worry. It's not like he's sworn of offensive attacks, he just needs training is all." Jeremie answered. "Overall I see him being a great asset to the team."

"But do you really want to get your family involved in this?" William asked. "And what if he blabs?"

"You don't know this, but Patrick is the best at keeping secrets. And he can most definitely handle himself. Not to mention that everyone but William are already friends with him. And knowing Patrick, William and him will get along just fine. Integrating him into our group would be easy." Jeremie answered. "And if he refuses, then there's nothing to worry about. He wouldn't tell a soul. So, we'll take our first vote, all for Patrick joining the group starting as soon as he gets here?" Jeremie smirked as he saw everyone's hand go up. "Good to hear. I'll contact him later."

"Well then it sounds like we found our recruit, can we go now?" Odd said impatiently, getting to his feet. "It's spaghetti and meatballs today."

"Hold on Odd, we're not done here." Aelita said. "We were looking for three recruits. Patrick makes one, but we need two more."

"Aww. Three? If we don't go now it'll all be cold when we finally get there." Odd complained sitting back down on the floor reluctantly. "I hate cold spaghetti almost as I hate X.A.N.A."

"What about Sissi?" William asked. "She's your friend now, right?" He turned to Jeremie. "And having the principle's daughter on the team could give us an easy escape for any trouble we get in fighting X.A.N.A." He said.

"Sissi?!" Yumi shot back. "She's given us more trouble than you did! Sure, she's been nicer lately but mainly to Ulrich. She still ignores me and Odd constantly."

"Not to mention she's always with Herb and Nicholas." Ulrich added. "If she left their side for one day, they'd probably follow her to the factory and discover our secret. And if you think either would keep their mouth shut for one day..."

"But William's right." Odd said. "Having Sissi in our circle could work. Honestly, I don't mind her ignoring me. It makes it easier for me to ignore her. But having her sweet-talk her dad every time we get detention for missing classes without a nurse's note, it'd be great."

"That could only work for so long." Jeremie said. "Eventually Delmas would overlook Sissi's opinion as a biased one." He said pushing up his glasses.

"So we recruit Principle Delmas too!" Odd yelled. "See, Problem solved."

"No." Yumi argued shaking her head slowly. "There's no way. The second we tell him, he'd call the cops, and we all know what happens then. They'll shut down the supercomputer."

"Wait!" William interrupted. "Why don't we just shut down the supercomputer?" He said turning to Jeremie. "X.A.N.A.'s not on the net anymore, he's been restricted to our supercomputer, so why don't we just pull the plug?"

Jeremie and Aelita shared a look. It wasn't William's fault he was being insensitive, after all he never knew about Franz possibly being alive. "First, shutting down the supercomputer is just running from the problem." Jeremie said. "Even if we do, someday another curious kid will come along and restart it. And at that point, we probably won't be here to fight him. And I don't need to remind you what kind of trouble we'd be in if someone found out everything we've done, with the document forging and impersonation to the whole not reporting a world-wide threat." Jeremie sighed. Time to let the cat out of the bag. "Second, we think there's a chance to find a trace of Franz Hopper."

"What?" Ulrich deadpanned.

"Franz? Aelita's dad?" William asked. "I thought he died on that mission."

"He did. But if there's just one single DNA strand of him left behind, it may be enough to bring him back completely."

"Were you going to tell us of this interesting news?" Odd asked incredulously. "Secrets, secrets, hurt someone."

"We weren't sure how you'd react." Aelita said. "Putting the entire world on the line just because I want to find my father, sounds a little foolish doesn't it?"

"I have to admit," William said. "it kinda does, but you guys are the experts here, what do we do?"

"Aelita, I know you want your dad back, but putting seven billion people on the line to do it?" Odd asked. "It just might not be worth it. We're only going on a hunch. I say we go to the core, and finish this for good."

"Even putting Franz aside, there are two other innocent lives trapped inside the computer. Shutting down the computer is an absolute no, not until we at least try to save them. If X.A.N.A. gives us too much trouble before then, we'll execute plan B and destroy Lyoko, agreed?" As everyone around him nodded, he continued. "Now, where were we? Oh yeah Delmas. We'll keep Sissi at a maybe, but Delmas is a definite no. Anyone else?" Jeremie asked.

"Maybe we were onto something with Delmas." Yumi said. "Delmas wouldn't work out, but what about Jim? He'd probably have stuck with us till the end of our last fight us if he wasn't affected by that return to the past. He's definitely proven himself capable of fighting."

"And if X.A.N.A. attacks during gym class, we'll have an easy out." Aelita added.

Ulrich shook his head. "But wouldn't excusing us all the time raise suspicions around Jim? Who knows? Delmas could even fire him again."

William leaned back slightly and met eyes with Ulrich. "But if we're able to call Jim, we can let him know about X.A.N.A. attacks early on so he can get the others to safety before X.A.N.A. kills them. Best yet, if anyone asks him about anything-"

"He'd rather not talk about it." Aelita finished for William.

William chuckled. "Exactly." He said.

"Yeah, but last time he was beaten within an inch of his life. Maybe we'd best leave the teachers out of this. Most of them couldn't keep up with us anyways. And Odd and I don't exactly have a good record with them." Ulrich said turning to Yumi. "Jim's happier being a teacher than he is a hero."

"All for Jim?" Jeremie asked. At the sight of only Yumi and Aelita raising their hands Jeremie shook his head. "Sorry, ladies. That's a no on Jim, then." Jeremie concluded. "And we're running out of people to choose from. Milly and Tamiya are to scoop-crazy to be trusted with anything confidential and Herb and Nicholas still hate us so they're out too."

"Ooh! Ooh!" Odd said raising his hand quickly. "Heidi Klinger! She could be a part of our group!"

"Interesting." Aelita answered. "Why her?" She asked. "Any hidden talents? Special training?"

"Well," Odd said eagerly. "she's really good looking, and...and..." Odd's face fell as he tried to think of another reason to bring Heidi in. "I'm pretty sure she threatened to punch me one time..." Odd looked back up at his friends.

"That's it?" Ulrich asked. "Jeez Odd. And I thought she told you to never talk to her again. We can't afford any tension within the group."

"Okay, how about Anais Fique?" Odd tried.

"Really Odd? Anais Fique?" Aelita said skeptically. "Are you out of your mind? We need strong people. People we can trust. And Anais is well..."

"An airhead? A snowflake?" William finished. "And she's probably one of the worst gossipers in school. Not a very good fit for a Lyoko Warrior."

"Odd, this is serious. We're looking for the strongest students. You can't just keep recommending girls because you find them attractive." Jeremie said.

"The hell I can't!" Odd shot back. "You asked for my-" Odd stopped in his tracks when he felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He whipped it out quickly and brought it up to his face, scanning the screen. After a few moments he looked back up at Jeremie. "Hey!" He exclaimed happily. "Listen to this!"

"Odd..." Jeremie said pinching the bridge of his nose. "Now's really not the time for memes. We still've only one person and a maybe!"

"I think I can make it two!" Odd shot back confidently. "If you'll let me speak, Einstein." Ahead of him Jeremie waved for him to talk. "I just got a text from Sam. She's going to be here in two days." Ulrich moved from his spot down to Odd's side to see the text for himself. "Her parents are hoping the discipline of boarding school will set her straight." Odd closed and pocketed his phone. "So did I just save the day, or did I just save the day?"

"You want Sam to be a Lyoko Warrior?" Jeremie asked.

"Isn't this the same girl that allowed you to take the fall for stealing that laptop? You know the one that almost got you expelled?" Yumi asked.

"And she nearly screwed us on Lyoko by not giving you my message. The same mission William was captured on." Ulrich added. "How is recruiting her going to help?"

"So she was in a bit of a rebellious stage. It's only because she doesn't have any real friends. Besides me, anyway." Odd said. "She's actually a very loyal girl. All we need to do is let her in, show her the way, give her something to fight for." Odd said making a fist in front of him. "She just longs for friendship just like everyone else."

"Is she a fighter?" William asked.

"No. Not right now, anyway." Odd said honestly. "But she's a fast learner. Show her a few beginners moves and she can pick up the rest in the field."

"I don't know..." Yumi said. "How do you even know about all this?"

"I may have stayed with her family for a week during break." He said scratching the back of his head. "Like I said, she doesn't have many friends."

"You flew all the way back here, just to stay for one week with the Knights and then fly straight back to Italy?" Ulrich asked. "That had to be more than you can afford."

"My parents payed for my flights. Anything beats being at home with my sisters to bully me around. You're just gonna have to trust me on this one. She's cool." Odd pleaded.

"Anyone opposed to Sam Knight being recruit number two?" Jeremie asked.

"Sorry, Odd." William said raising his hand. "If she really was a driving factor in you not being around to help me and Aelita on that day, then I have to object."

"Me too." Yumi said. "We barely know this girl and Odd's judgement is rarely the best."

After scanning the room for any more raised hands, he nodded. "Overruled. Good, then we only need one more." He told them.

"Theo?" Aelita offered. "He's athletic enough." She pointed out. "He's so athletic that I don't think we'll even need to train him. He gets along with everyone which automatically makes him a better choice than Sissi." Aelita said.

"I don't know. He's also an attention hog." William argued. "I've hung out with the guy a couple times, and I can confidently say he'll do anything for attention." He said. "If he sees himself as a hero, there's no way he wouldn't brag about it to at least one person. Especially Sissi, who you've said yourself, can't be trusted."

"I see your point. But I still think he could be very valuable to the team." Aelita said. "We have Sam who definitely needs training and Patrick who might need training, it'd be nice to have someone who doesn't need it."

"Hey, what about Emillie? She's smart, fast, not much of a heavy hitter, but we can work around that." Ulrich suggested. "Plus, me and her are already close so there's no need to fear any tension."

"Isn't she also a ball of anxiety, though?" Odd pointed out. "All we would need to tell her is that the world's in danger and she'd probably faint. And I thought we weren't supposed to make tension between the six of us. Me and her have a rocky relationship to say the least." Odd said looking to Ulrich for a response.

"That's because you had the bright idea of going out with two girls at one time." Ulrich countered. "But she obviously found something about you charming, so you shouldn't be too worried. It's not like her to hold a grudge forever."

"But forever isn't even close to over yet!" Odd cried. "She promised to kick me where it hurts if I ever said a word to her again!"

"I'll second Emillie." Aelita said. "Ulrich's right, that girl has one heck of a brain on her."

"So," Jeremie said getting to his feet. "It seems we have three potential candidates for our last new Lyoko Warrior. Sissi Delmas, Theo Gauthier, and Emillie LeDuc. We only need one more warrior, any more and we might not be able to keep control of this group. So, before I put it to a vote, is there anyone you guys can rule out right off the bat?" Jeremie asked.

"Sissi." Yumi said confidently. "It just won't work with her on the team."

"Sissi." Aelita agreed. "Too unpredictable."

"Sissi." Ulrich and William said in unison. The two looked at each other for one moment making eye contact, before looking away. "Sissi has a huge capability a creating a rift between us, it's not like she's never done it before." Ulrich said.

Odd sighed. "Sissi. You're right she couldn't sweet-talk her father every time. It's for the best."

"Sissi is officially off the list then." Jeremie nodded. "With that we vote. Hands in the air for Theo, hands down for Emillie." Jeremie ordered. He scanned the room twice just to be sure, then nodded a second time. "Alright we have our third Warrior. You guys can go to lunch, I'm going to stay here and see if I can reach Patrick. He's landing here in France tomorrow." He said waving them off. "I want him all caught up before he gets here so if X.A.N.A. attacks he'll be at least somewhat ready."

"I'm staying here." Aelita said putting a hand on Jeremie's shoulder. "You might need a second party to convince him none of this is a joke." As Odd, William, Yumi, and Ulrich left the room for the cafeteria, Jeremie began typing away at his keyboard rapidly. "Do you think Patrick will believe you? Even from someone who's known about X.A.N.A. and was trapped in the supercomputer with X.A.N.A., I know this is all farfetched."

"Farfetched, yes, but fiction? Not a chance. Honestly, I have no clue whether or not he'll believe us, but I sure hope he does."

"There is one more problem though." Aelita said. "If we bring in new members, there's no doubt in my mind that X.A.N.A. will attempt to gain at least one more puppet. What are you going to tell your aunt if her son goes missing because he was taken?"

"That, my dear Aelita, is one of the main reasons we really need William back." Jeremie answered. "I didn't tell him this yet," He started typing on his computer and a transparent 3D diagram of William came into view. "because I didn't want to freak him out, but X.A.N.A. hasn't left him completely, not yet at least."

"What? How? I thought you said you didn't find anything."

"I didn't say anything because that would give the group ample reason to suspect William, when he wasn't the one to turn the computer back on. This diagram is from the scanner that he was in from the day he got back to the real world. See that?" He asked pointing to a blipping red dot inside Willam's head. "That's an imprint that X.A.N.A. left on him from the time he was under his control. Also, from what I can tell, it makes him mind more susceptible to X.A.N.A.'s tricks. If X.A.N.A. wants his body guard back, it won't be hard to override his mind once again thanks to that little sign."

"That's terrible!" Aelita said. "So William's in even more danger? There's gotta be something we can do for him."

"There is. Thanks to the scanner I can truly analyze this little imprint. If I can find out how it works-"

"You could reverse-engineer it to work against X.A.N.A.! We can make some kind of resistance for William!" Aelita finished. "That's brilliant Jeremie!"

"Not just William," Jeremie said closing the model of William. "if I can find out enough about it, I can make a resistance imprint for everyone. No one will be in danger of becoming X.A.N.A.'s new puppet."

Aelita leaned over and kissed Jeremie on the cheek once more. "Excellent work as usual Jeremie." She smirked.

"It'll take some time. So, to begin with, the new recruits will have to be extra careful." Jeremie said. "Once I've got the imprints figured I'll start work on the security system."

Jeremie hit the enter key on the board and the screen in front of him turned to an animatic phone wagging back and forth. "Get ready to share your life's story, Aelita."

The phone blipped away with a flash of a strobe and the screen revealed a slightly low-resolution image of Jeremie's cousin Patrick. A brunette boy dressed in all black. "Jerry! And Aelita! To what do I owe the pleasure?" He said smiling.

"Jerry?" Aelita asked.

"I told you we got really close. Hey, Patrick. Uh...are your parents home?" Jeremie asked. "Or your sister?"

"Nope, sister's on a date and Ma and Pop are at a movie for their own date night." Patrick answered. "I was just finishing packing. I can't wait to meet up with you in France, Jerry." He said happily. "Your friends seemed so great the last time I saw them."

"They are." Jeremie assured him. "Listen, Patrick. I need to talk to you about something extremely important. But if I do, I need you to promise not to tell a soul." Jeremie pleaded.

"Alright Jerry, what did you do?" Patrick smirked. "You got a B on a test? Were you late for class and got five points off your participation grade?" He guessed chuckling to himself.

"I'm serious Patrick, this isn't a joke."

"Oh." Patrick said setting his suitcase of the bed behind him. "You're serious. Alright, yeah. You know me. Best secret keeper in the world."

"Time to rip off the band-aid, Jeremie." Aelita told him. "Tell him."

"Patrick, for the last couple years, me and my friends Ulrich, Odd, Yumi, and Aelita have been fighting an evil artificial intelligence called X.A.N.A., in a virtual world called Lyoko. Located inside a giant supercomputer."

Patrick let out another chuckle. "What are you talking about?" He said smiling.

"All I wanted was to find parts for my robot, but I found a giant supercomputer with what I perceived as another artificial intelligence inside called Aelita. By turning the supercomputer back on I awakened an evil program created by a man named Franz Hopper to destroy a government program. But something happened and X.A.N.A. got corrupted. Now he wants nothing but the extinction of the human race." Jeremie said quickly. "X.A.N.A. gets to our world by activating towers in the virtual world Aelita lived in-"

"Jeremie, you're freakin' me out, man." Patrick interrupted. "I thought Aelita is that cute Pink haired girl standing next to you."

"That is the same Aelita. You see, only she could deactivate the towers so I assembled a team consisting of my other friends, to escort Aelita safely to the towers and protect her from X.A.N.A. while simultaneously working on a way to materialize Aelita onto Earth to save her. We kept our secret by using a program I created called Return to the Past which erased everyone's memories of the last 24 hours. Eventually I succeeded in making Aelita human with a program called Code: EARTH, but we couldn't destroy X.A.N.A. because he had taken part of her DNA code keeping her still connected to the supercomputer. We couldn't shut it off without killing Aelita, so we continued to fight X.A.N.A., learned Aelita was the daughter of Franz Hopper, and many months later defeated X.A.N.A. We thought we killed him. But he's back. And we need help."

"You mean to tell me that Aelita was a computer program when you met her, trapped in virtual world with an evil entity, until you, Jeremie Belpois, eighth-grader, created a program to bring her to Earth with a physical body? And then killed the evil program saving your school?"

"We actually saved the world." Aelita said. "X.A.N.A. had called on asteroids and satellites, created a zombie virus that infected nearly the whole school, and even sent his monsters to the real world to attack us. He can even possess people with what we call specters and give them superhuman strength. He's a much bigger threat than you realize."

"So, you're actually a virtual girl turned human after losing your humanity by somehow being trapped in a computer?" Patrick asked with his right eyebrow raised.

"Yes. My father virtualized me into Lyoko to protect me but I had lost my memories of him because of X.A.N.A." Aelita answered. "But thanks to Jeremie I got them back and remembered my humanity."

"Anyway, X.A.N.A.'s back. And he's stronger than he ever has been before. He's back to being restricted to our supercomputer but he's growing stronger as we speak. We need help. Will you help us save the world, Patrick?" Jeremie asked.

Patrick sat down on his bed and just stared at the screen for a moment. He started to laugh very lightly before exploding into hysteria and laying back on his bed. A couple seconds of pure laughter later he got back up and looked the screen wiping a tear from his eye. "Oh, Jerry. You actually had me going there for a second. And you said you were terrible with jokes. Aw, man. Listen Jerry, I gotta finish packing. I got a lot to do tomorrow before I can leave for the airport."

Jeremie let out an angered sigh. "If only we hadn't used the return to the past on you!" He growled. "Then you'd remember our fight with Herb and Sissi! Sure, it wasn't much of a fight. They beat us both to a pulp with their electricity but-"

"A fight with electricity?" Patrick asked to no one. On the other side of the screen Patrick grabbed his head. "Aaaah!" Patrick quickly fell over onto the floor of his room and cried out some more.

"Patrick!" Jeremie and Aelita yelled.

Patrick began rolling back and forth on the rug with his head still in his hands. His mind started flashing images inside his head. He could see himself in Jeremie's dorm. Before he could confirm anything else. A black-haired girl grabbed his coat frills of his coat and slammed him up against Jeremie's dresser with more force than a girl her age should have. Another flash and he was in the corridor, grabbing the girl by the arm, and tackling her against the wall. She growled back at him he looked into her eyes. Her eyes. They had some weird emblem glitching in place of her pupils. She easily shrugged him off and kicked him into the ceiling. A third flash showed him on a stairwell with the girl below him. He could see himself jump of the stairs and tackle the girl once again. As he she got up, he looked to her, still on his knees, to find bolts of electricity fire into his person knocking him back into the stairs and knocking him out. Patrick halted his movements and let out a deep gasp as he jolted his body upwards. He grabbed the table in front of him and staggered to his feet.

"Patrick!" Jeremie exclaimed. "Are you okay? What happened?"

"I saw things. It's like I was in another life." He said panting. "I saw me and some girl in pink fighting. She threw me against a dresser, kicked me into the ceiling, and even fired lightning bolts at me. And her eyes...there was something wrong with her eyes. There was some sort of bullseye in her eyes." He told them. "Jeremie, you're smart. What's happening?"

"I have a theory but I don't know how it happened." Jeremy said. He turned to Aelita still beside him. "You thinking what I'm thinking?" Jeremie asked.

Aelita nodded. "That wasn't a dream, it was a flashback." She informed him. "Somehow the Return to the Past must not have worked on you. Everything you saw must have happened before we reversed time. But I don't know how you did it."

"I can't confirm it right now, but I think that the return in time has a flaw we never encountered. It happened right after I mentioned the fight so maybe giving certain details of a past encounter can trigger your memory to come back. I'll have to look into this, but Patrick, that symbol you saw is the sign of X.A.N.A." Jeremie told him. "You can always tell who's possessed by that symbol."

"So X.A.N.A. is real? The story of Aelita, asteroids, monsters, it's all true?" Patrick asked. "Why didn't you call the cops?"

"They would've shut down the supercomputer and killed Aelita in our early days, and we kinda became criminals after that." Jeremie said sadly. "There were times when we really wanted to tell someone but I didn't want to risk Aelita."

"Criminals? What did you do?" Patrick asked.

"We didn't know I was actually a human turned virtual in the beginning. We thought I was just a program codenamed Aelita." Aelita said. "So in order for me to live on Earth without leading anybody on to the supercomputer, Jeremie had to...forge my records. Setting me up under the name Aelita Stones."

"You forged government records?!" Patrick yelled incredulously. "I knew you were good but...wow." He said shaking his head. "I'm going to assume you know what kind of trouble you could get in if you're found out."

"Of course. I knew what I was getting into as soon as I promised Aelita I'd materialize her onto Earth." He smiled. He wrapped his left arm around Aelita. "But it was worth it. We got Aelita out of it." Aelita smiled down at Jeremie. She leaned down and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"As happy as I am you got yourself a girlfriend, don't you think forging her an identity would be going a bit too far?"

"Maybe. But I wouldn't change a thing." Jeremie smirked. "So, are you in, Patrick? We need your help."

"I suppose if I say no, you use your time reverser thing to erase my memories again."

"We can't." Jeremie said pushing up his glasses. "The return trips make X.A.N.A. stronger. We have to use them only when absolutely necessary. But more importantly we wouldn't have to. I trust you. I don't think you'll out me. You know me, I'm a good guy. I just had to do some bad things to give Aelita a second chance. But on the slight chance you do tell someone, we'll always be cousins."

"Nice speech, Jerry. I'll admit, your story is crazy. You're crazy, and your girlfriend seems crazier. But..." He started ruffling his hair. "those visions were so real. And if you're really risking your life fighting for the world, I guess I can't let you do it alone. I'm in. But I still don't approve of your choices."

"Glad to hear you're in. And the gang will be too. It was a unanimous vote to bring you in. By the way, there's a guy here you haven't met. His name is William, he's cool, but he'll be hanging out with our group a lot more from now on." Jeremie said. "Once you get to Kadic, we will take you to be scanned in and you'll officially be immune to the return in times."

"I'd better go." Patrick said. "My parents are home and I need time to process all this." He said.

"Remember you can back out any time, Patrick." Jeremy assured him. "William and Yumi have a class, but the rest of us will be there to meet you at the airport."

"See you then, cous." He said waving off.

The screen blipped back to a pure blue screen, and Jeremie turned to Aelita offering his hand up in the air in front of him. Aelita nodded and high-fived the blonde smiling. "That's one down. With Patrick on board, things are already a hundred times better." Jeremie said happily.

"But I think you're forgetting the fact that Patrick just remembered his fight with a X.A.N. Sissi after we launched a return to the past." Aelita said. "If he can do it, who says Sissi can't, or Jim, or even worse the principle. There are countless people in this school who could regain their memories of our escapades." She frowned. "And if they shut down the supercomputer..."

"I know. We'll lose any chance of finding your father or saving the hostages and probably be taken in for an interrogation too." Jeremie said sadly. "But as long as we don't discuss the past with outsiders, we should be fine. You can go down to the cafeteria and eat, I'm going to the factory to take a look at what caused the loophole in the return program."

Aelita's eyes narrowed. "Oh, no you don't!" Aelita said grabbing his wrist tightly. "We aren't doing this again. I let you miss too many meals the last time we fought X.A.N.A. You're going to supper." She asserted.

~ Kadic Cafeteria ~

Dinner hour was mostly over and as Jeremie and Aelita approached the cafeteria, hand in hand, the two caught a glimpse of Ulrich, Odd, Yumi, and William leaving the building with smiles on their faces. Odd spotted them quickly and started waving at them. "Hey, look!" The joker called. "The Einstein's finally came to get their portions!" He said laughing to himself.

"And with only twenty minutes left of dinner hour, they'd better eat fast or Jim'll end up locking them inside when he closes it for the night." Ulrich added. "Not to mention they'll miss class."

Jeremie and Aelita finally came to a stop in front of them. "We would have gotten here sooner, but Jeremie's been fighting me every step of the way." Aelita groaned. "He really doesn't want to take a break."

"My efforts are best spent countering X.A.N.A., not stuffing my face!" Jeremie protested. "If we're going to win this fight, I need to get to the factory to-"

Odd put a finger to his mouth shushing Jeremie. "Easy Einstein." He hitched a finger over his left shoulder and everyone followed the direction to find Sissi, Herb, and Nicholas standing by the vending machine. "Any louder and we'll have to recruit the entire school after all." He said. "Although it would be nice for my plan to be used for once."

William quickly laughed at the younger boy. "You're not good at making plans and you know it." He said. "More importantly how'd it go with your cousin? Is he going to help?" William asked tilting his head.

"Yes. He'll be here tomorrow. But only because he remembered his fight with Sissi from a couple years ago."

Ulrich's eyes widened. "How is that possible? I thought we launched the you-know-what that day." He said.

"We did." Aelita confirmed, nodding. "But it seems discussing certain details of those erased memories can trigger a recovery of some sort. This could be our undoing. If the right person hears us talking about the wrong thing, they could regain their memories and call the authorities. No more discussing Lyoko related things at the lunch table." She said.

"But we could easily use it for our own purposes too." Jeremie said. "Patrick has agreed, but we still need our other two warriors and using this method could be the deciding factor as it was with Patrick. Tomorrow, Aelita and I will go to the factory to see what we can find out about this glitch in the program. Odd, Ulrich, I need you two to call Sam before you start your homework. We need her answer right away in case we need to fill her spot with someone else."

"What if she doesn't fancy the whole situation. Having someone know of what we're up to could be extremely dangerous. Especially if there's already someone around here who's against us." William pointed out.

"If she threatens anything, we may have to launch a return in time. I've weighed the risk and rewards, and I think we're doing the right thing. Sam's too much of a rebel kid to contact any authorities, anyways." Jeremie said confidently.

"All right." Aelita interrupted. She got behind Jeremy and pushed him lightly toward the cafeteria door. "Enough business, time for some break time." She asserted.

"But can I just-" Jeremie started before Aelita grabbed his arm again pulling him towards the door. "Aelita. I need to-"

"Eat." Aelita interrupted stepping up the two cement stairs in front of them. "I know. And if I have to drag you to every meal, I will."

"William, Yumi, go find-" With the Aelita finally got Jeremie into the cafeteria, cutting his voice off mid-sentence. She waved goodbye to the others as she stepped into the room.

"I'd feel so emasculated if I were him." Odd said. "If this were a dating sim, he would've just gotten minus two sex appeal." Odd sighed. "Well, nothing to do now but get to our room and let the torture begin. Yumi, if I don't make it past tonight, do you promise to take care of Kiwi?" Odd asked.

"It's just Botany homework." William chuckled. "It won't kill you."

"Oh yeah! Laugh it up! You weren't there for the tree roots!" Odd howled pointing a finger at William. "You haven't seen the bad side of botany!"

"Roots?" William asked turning to Yumi. "Is that supposed to freak me out?" He inquired slyly. "I think Odd needs to find scarier movies."

Yumi shivered in response as Odd and Ulrich sulked away. "X.A.N.A. roots are freaky, especially when they get grabby."

William shrugged. "If you say so. Say, shouldn't we see what it was that Jeremie was trying to tell us? It was probably important."

"You didn't get it?" Yumi asked raising an eyebrow. As William shook his head Yumi smirked. "Come on, William. He just gets back from recruiting Patrick, then immediately tells Ulrich and Odd to call Sam, so logically it would make sense for us to-"

"Okay." William interrupted. "I get it. Do you know the way?" He asked. "Cause I have no clue."

"Follow me, Casanova." Yumi ordered. "We're heading to the art room; their class ends in roughly a half-hour."

"If it ends in a half-hour, why are we leaving right now?" William asked. "I was gonna go get something from the vending machines."

"Later." Yumi said sternly. "You and I need to have a talk, now." She said.

~Odd and Ulrich's Dorm~

Ulrich was on the floor leaned up against his bed, head buried in his textbook, while Odd was laying on his back on top of his bed, phone to his ear. "Sam? Yeah, it's me." Odd said. Across from him Ulrich plugged two earpieces into his ears and groaned. "Yeah I had something to talk to you about...no it couldn't wait." Seeing as Ulrich had headphones in, and Odd could hear the music from his spot, he quickly hit the speakerphone button.

'Odd listen, now's really not a good time. It's one AM here in America and I have things to do tomorrow. What is it?' Her voice spoke irritably.

'How do I break this one to her?' Odd thought to himself. "Do you believe in the supernatural? You know, like ghosts or evil forces?"

'Seriously?' Sam said, obviously not amused. 'You woke me up to ask me that? Are you trying to piss me off? Just let me be.'

"No, wait!" Odd yelled holding his hands out in front of him.

"Odd! I'm trying to study here!" Ulrich scolded. "Did you forget that they just added pop quizzes to our class?!"

"Well, I'm trying to SAVE THE WORLD! Really? After running my ear off about your William angst, you're going to get mad at me when I'm being productive." Odd shot back. "And a little backup wouldn't be unappreciated." He snapped.

'Did you just say save the world?' Sam's voice asked. 'Odd have you been playing that stupid alien invaders game again?'

"Listen, Sam. I'm going to tell you something and I need you to promise not to tell anyone. Not even your diary, okay?" Odd asked.

'Sure, anything to get me back to sleep.' Sam said. 'Just make it quick.'

Odd looked to Ulrich who nodded carefully. "Sam we need your help. We've been hiding something big. Something that if the wrong person found out, we aren't the only ones who'll be in trouble."

'Odd I told you Kasey didn't know what he was talking about! Eating that stuff is-' Sam started.

"No! No. You see...a couple years ago my friends and I, we fought an evil computer program. It's inside this giant supercomputer just outside the school, deep underground. It's called X.A.N.A. and it won't stop until humanity is destroyed. Years ago, we thought we defeated it. It was supposed to be erased forever, but someone revived it and now it's stronger than ever. We need more people to help us fight it. I can't explain it all right now, but we could really use your help." Odd said. "Will you?"

'Let me get this straight. You call me in the middle of the night to tell me that years ago you, who would've been an eighth grader, and your friends, more eighth graders, fought an evil program called Xanax-'

"X.A.N.A." Odd corrected.

Sam sighed. 'X.A.N.A., who was bent on humanity's destruction, but despite being just kids, defeated it and saved the world without anyone knowing? And now it's back for vengeance or something like that and you want me to fight, too?'

"I know it's a big request-" Odd started

'I'm going back to bed. I suggest you go see the nurse to check for any head injuries. If something serious comes up don't hesitate to call, but otherwise... let...me...sleep!'

"A little help here, Ulrich?!" Odd snapped. "She's gonna hang up!"

Ulrich rolled his eyes and approached the phone. He leaned over to get close to the microphone. "Sam, it's me, Ulrich. Before you hang up can you answer me one last question?"

'Ugh, fine, but then I'm done.' She gave. 'I really need my sleep.'

"Do you ever have weirdly real dreams? Ones with me and Odd in them. Maybe a school building sinking into the ground with you trapped inside a computer lab? Anything like that?"

'...Who told you that!? Was it my therapist?! I knew his ethical code was bologna from the start! Telling people about my recurring dreams is so not cool!' Sam ranted. 'I've had that dream constantly for years, but don't know what it... means...' There was a long pause between the two lines.

"Sam? Did you hang up?" Odd asked. "Aw, man she thinks we're crazy!" Odd panicked.

'Something's wrong with my... head.' Sam groaned. 'It hurts. Bad. I think I'm getting a migraine.'

"I don't think that's a migraine. Think, Sam. Sam try to remember." Ulrich said. "All that stuff you think is a dream really happened. But we erased your memory and reset time."

'Impossible.' She managed. 'You guys...watch too many cartoons.'

"You tried to steal a computer, but you got caught. Odd took the fall and you got locked in a computer lab. Remember? We busted you out and took you to the factory. You saw the computer for yourself." Ulrich pressed. The two boys heard a loud, painful, groan from the other side along with what sounded like a creaking bed.

'...I'm not dreaming, am I? X.A.N.A. It's real isn't it?' She said bewildered. Odd could hear her breathing getting heavier over time.

"He's real." Odd confirmed after a moment. "And someone has to fight him. Somehow that duty falls on us." He told her.

'The authorities? Or surely you can just shut down the computer.' She tried.

"Yeah...about that. One of our friend's dad could be somehow stuck in the computer along with two other innocent people. I don't have time to explain, for now, all that's left is...are you in? I won't lie, you could get seriously hurt...or killed." Odd told her.

'Listen when I arrive at Kadic, first chance you get, I want you to take me to this supercomputer. You sound serious, but it is you and you have to admit, you sound crazy. We'll talk more tomorrow. Good night, Odd.'

"But-"

'Don't worry, I won't tell anyone...for now. If this isn't some sort of bad dream, then I'm kinda flattered you want me to help.'

"Of course, we want you to help, Sam. You're my friend. And if you'd like-"

"Dude." Ulrich said interrupting him pointing at the blank screen. "She hung up, man."

"Oh."

"Call Einstein and let him know Sam's probably in. He'll want to know right away so he can do whatever it is that he's got up his sleeve. Then I need you to do me a favor." Ulrich said.

"Sure. What do you need?"

"Keep it down." He said sternly. He plugged both earbuds back into his ears and buried his nose back into his textbook.

~Art Room~

Yumi and William were patiently waiting outside the Kadic art room for the current period to end. William was leaned up against the side of one of the pillars holding the ceiling above them while Yumi sat down in front of the column, knees bunched up close. Yumi was currently holding her dark blue phone up to her ear attentively listening to Jeremie's report. "Yeah. Okay...I understand Jeremie, we're right outside waiting for the class to end." She spoke. "Good to hear. I'll let William know. Keep me posted on anything else that comes up." She hung up and returned the phone to her pocket. "According to what Odd told Jeremie, Sam more or less agreed."

"So that's two." He said staring forward. "Are you gonna tell me why we needed to be here about thirty minutes before the class is even over? Or am I supposed to read your mind."

"We need to talk, William." Yumi said seriously. "And it needs to be done now."

"Yeah you told me that part but nothing else. I really hope you didn't drag me away from my snack time just to discuss gas prices." William retorted. "What's this about?"

"You." Yumi said honestly. "We need to talk about you."

William let out a sigh. "I had a feeling that's what this was about. You don't feel like I should be part of the team. You don't think I have what it takes to be a Lyoko Warrior."

"No, I don't." Yumi answered. "I think you're hotheaded, you're cocky, and you nearly got yourself and Aelita killed on multiple occasions. So in my humble opinion, should you fight with us? No. And after hearing your side I have one thing to say to you: I'm sorry."

"What?" William said turning to her.

"It's true that you don't scream 'Lyoko Warrior' to me, but that was no excuse for what I did...what we did." Yumi said. "Excluding you like that, especially after such a traumatizing experience was cruel of us, and if I could undo it I would."

"Really?"

Yumi nodded. "All those times when you wanted to sit with us, talk to us, know what we were up to, all you wanted was a friend, we turned you away. I had no idea it hurt you that much. Did you really have nobody for that whole time?"

"Yes and no. I always have Mom and Dad." William said. "But there's a form of companionship that they just can't fulfill."

"Did you hate us?" Yumi asked sadly.

"Honestly? For a while. I wasn't asking you to marry me, just talk to me. But after the first few months of silence, I started to get it. I couldn't force you guys to be my friends. Then the nightmares came. For months every dream and daydream I had was something to do with X.A.N.A. I think, somehow, I knew he was alive, like I was still connected to him somehow. The dreams kept getting worse and worse before I finally broke during break. I knew I had to try one last time. So, I went to Aelita."

"And here we are." Yumi finished for him. "Outside an art room waiting for a class that isn't ours to end so we can ask another kid if they want to join the fight. Well, at least I have you here with me so if I end up looking crazy, I won't be lonely in the looney bin."

William chuckled. "You know, we may be facing certain death, but at least I got to make jokes with you again, so if we fail, maybe it was worth it. I honestly expected you to be a lot more opposing like Ulrich."

"Give Ulrich time." Yumi smiled. "Believe it or not, he doesn't hate you. He doesn't even dislike you. He's just going through a lot of stress right now. His dad's being a pain, he's worried about keeping his grades up, and now his whole life just turned upside down again now that X.A.N.A.'s back. Just keep your flirty side to a minimum and show us you're a team player and he'll warm up to you in no time."

"I just have a bubbly personality!"

"You were hitting on me. Hardcore." Yumi said sternly. "And we both know that Ulrich's got a jealous personality, admittedly so do I. Just don't try to 'woo' me, and you and Ulrich will be best buds by the end of the week." She smiled.

"I suppose it was a losing battle from the beginning, huh?" William said.

"Yeah. Ulrich and I had fallen long before you came into the picture." Yumi said. "So, what do you say? We put this whole situation behind us and start anew?"

"That sounds great." William smiled. The doors behind them flew open and the upperclassman began spilling out of the room in a series of moans and laughs. William and Yumi both turned to face the oncoming crowd searching for their target. "I hope Jeremie was right about this class."

"He hacked into the list of students. He couldn't be wrong." Yumi replied. "There!" Yumi said pointing ahead. As the crowd dispersed, they revealed a single girl holding her books close to her chest heading towards the two of them. She had long dark hair and a pink and red t-shirt on with light brown pants and shoes to match.

"Emillie!" William yelled, waving his arm up high. "Over here!"

Emillie snapped her head towards William and cocked her head to the side. She made her way towards the duo at a leisurely pace. "William? Yumi? What are you guys doing here? You don't have this class."

"We wanted to talk with you." Yumi said carefully getting to her feet.

"Me?" She asked, confused. "Why?"

~Abandoned Factory~

~Two days later~

Jeremie was sitting in his chair typing away on the supercomputer getting everything ready for the initiation. Beside him William and Odd watched patiently in anticipation. In the two days the gang spent waiting for Patrick and Sam to arrive at Kadic they had been closely monitoring X.A.N.A., who had surprisingly not launched an attack yet, while also waiting for Jeremie to finish the security system for the factory so they could catch whoever it was who was conspiring with X.A.N.A. "Alright Aelita, everything's set up. Whenever you're ready." He spoke into his headset.

In the scanner room below the rest of the Lyoko Warriors stood proud. In front of the first scanner was Patrick, to his right stood Sam, and in front of the last scanner was Emillie. Aelita stepped forward and nodded. "Jeremie said to start the initiation. Once the three of you are scanned in, you'll officially be fully immune to the return trips. There's still time to back out." Aelita said. After a moment of silence, she turned back to Yumi and Ulrich. The two nodded and stepped forward as well. "Patrick," Aelita said turning to the first new recruit. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices?"

Patrick decked out in black pants and a leather jacket, took a deep breath. "I promise." He said with passion. The pod on his side slid open And Aelita gestured towards it. Patrick carefully took a step inside and the doors closed behind him.

'Transfer, Patrick. Scanner, Partrick.' Jeremie said over the intercom. The pod lit up with a bright white light before the doors slid back open revealing Patrick holding himself up against the scanner wall.

"How do you feel?" Aelita asked.

"Drained. But determined." He said smirking

"Sam," Yumi said moving on. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices?"

"I promise." Sam nodded. Like Patrick the doors to Scanner two slid open and Sam took a step inside, turning around as the doors slid shut.

'Transfer, Sam. Scanner, Sam.'

After another brief light show Sam stepped outside the pod and looked at her hands. "I don't feel any different. Huh."

"Emillie," Ulrich copied. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices."

"I promise." She said before turning around. She took a good look at the scanner in front of her. She turned to face Ulrich with a weird look on her face. Ulrich's heart dropped as he feared his friend was having second thoughts. "This thing doesn't use radiation, does it? Cause I really like my arms and legs where they are now and-"

"It's perfectly safe. We've done it hundreds of times before and we're just fine. There's no need to worry." Emillie nodded before she too stepped inside a scanner.

'Transfer, Emillie. Scanner, Emillie.' The doors shut behind her as Yumi guided Sam and Patrick back upstairs. By the time they were all the way up the ladder, Emillie was stepping out of Scanner Three to see the welcoming smiles of Ulrich and Aelita. The three of them climbed the ladder to find Odd, Yumi, William, Patrick, and Sam gathered around Jeremie who still sat in his chair. The joined the semi-circle and all eyes were on Jeremie.

"You're all officially immune to the return to the pasts." Jeremie said. "the plan went off without a hitch, which worries me."

"Why?" Emillie asked. "Your team is three stronger now. Isn't it a good thing that X.A.N.A. left us alone?"

"Yes and no." Aelita said. "It's not like X.A.N.A. to just sit back and let us do what we want. Jeremie and I predicted at least two separate attacks in an attempt to stop this plan. But X.A.N.A.'s been silent for three straight days. Why?"

"It's possible that he doesn't feel threatened by our increased numbers." William pointed out. "Which could also mean he's got new tricks up his sleeve."

"Or worse..." Jeremie sighed. "This is exactly what he wants."


	2. Return to Lyoko

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> X.A.N.A. launches his first attack since Jeremie brought the team back together. A terrible illness takes over the school, and it seems Jeremie's in no position to help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By the way, just nipping this in the bud, this was written months before the word 'Corona' had ever been uttered. Just saying before I get twenty people pointing out how I'm some sort of hack.

~Jeremie's Dorm~

~9:00 P.M.~

Jeremie and Aelita, both in their nightwear, were staring at Jeremie's small computer screen, both fixated on the same point. The same imprint Jeremie had shown Aelita earlier that week. The two had spent the last five hours, and consequently their date night, trying to decipher the secrets of the imprint. Tired and frustrated he slammed his head on his desk. "I don't believe this! A few days ago, this thing was booming with energy signals, but now there's nothing significant being shown about this thing. I'm starting to wonder if my hypothesis is correct after all!"

"It has to do something." Aelita argued. "Otherwise X.A.N.A. wouldn't have gone through the trouble of leaving it behind. Maybe we just need a break from this. You finished the security system, right? Anyone else try to break in?"

"No." Jeremie said sadly. "We're no closer to finding out who turned on the supercomputer and revived X.A.N.A. either!"

"Well who are the suspects?" Aelita asked.

"That's the thing, there are none. I've got a list of every person here at Kadic, student and faculty, that I definitely didn't hack out of the school's system." He said emphasizing his 'definitely'. "Whoever it was would have to have intimate knowledge of computers and programming, and has to know about the factory and have ties to Kadic, since it's private property. If Sam and Patrick could recover some of their lost memories, it's possible that someone who came here under X.A.N.A.'s influence could remember about this place. So first I took the nine of us off the list, then I took off everyone we don't know."

"Right." Aelita nodded. "Because they never would've even met us."

"Exactly. That left a lot less people. But still too many to make any kind of guess." Jeremie said. "So, I did background checks on everyone left, looking for any backgrounds or hints of interest in computers or programming. Once that was done, I crossed off any who had no history, and that left... no one." He said handing her the small list of remaining people. Aelita quickly scanned it and found violent lines through every name. "Not a single one has any background in programming. None of them had the slightest hint."

"Maybe it's a secret hobby of theirs?" Aelita said crumpling up the piece of paper and throwing it over her shoulder.

"Even then, none of them have any reason to revive X.A.N.A. None of them have any vendettas, knowledge of X.A.N.A., or anything to gain." Jeremie said. He dipped his head backwards and covered his face with his hands. "What the hell is going on?"

"Well there's one possibility we haven't considered." Aelita countered. "What if it was somebody we don't know. Someone who has connections to X.A.N.A. and we never even knew." She asked before sitting down on Jeremie's bed. "There's no limit to his reach after all."

"If X.A.N.A. had another person in his back pocket, why didn't he ever use him the last time we fought? Why let himself be destroyed like that if he could help it? It doesn't make any sense."

"Could he have X.A.N.A.-fied someone and used them as a puppet to turn the supercomputer back on? It would explain how someone got that kind of knowledge, too." Aelita guessed. "And the puppet would have no idea what happened when they were released."

"With the supercomputer off? Even if X.A.N.A. could, he would need more power than he would have at his base components in order to possess someone." Jeremie said. "That's out the window, too! The longer it takes for us to figure this out, the more chances X.A.N.A. has to use his ally against us." He groaned.

"And what about William?" Aelita asked warily.

"What about him?" Jeremie asked back. "You think he did it?"

"Not of his own free will. You said that the imprint gives X.A.N.A. easier control over people. Maybe it left some kind of...post hypnotic suggestion, just like Ulrich suggested. It could explain how X.A.N.A. did it without the computer being on with the implant in place."

"I didn't want to believe it." Jeremie said sadly. "But it seems like a very distinct possibility at this point. But if he did, it's likely he has no idea he ever did it. I don't want to bring this up to him just yet. He's been through enough already, and I want to be sure before we go accusing him of something like that."

"We've done enough for tonight. You're obviously overworked." She said getting back up. "You need a stress-reliever." She put a hand on his shoulder causing him to look up at her.

"I can think of one thing that calms me down." Jeremie smiled.

"And what's that?" Aelita asked knowingly.

"You." Jeremie said standing up. "We could-"

The two were interrupted by a loud throat clearing. They turned towards the door to see it slowly open revealing Jim on the other side with his eyes narrowed. "This again? Belpois! Stones! Quit the PDA and get over here." The two hung their heads and reluctantly made their way to Jim. Once the two were in front of him, he started shaking his head. "Model Students, both of you! I'd expect this kind of behavior from Della-Robia, or Stern, or even Ishiyama from time to time. But you two? Again? You know what this means right?"

"Aw come on Jim!" Jeremie whined. "You don't really have to turn us in, do you? You said it yourself, we're model students. We'd never participate in any unethical activities."

"Except meeting in your dorm with your girlfriend after lights out. Sorry, Belpois, but no one gets a free pass. Now I want Stones back on her floor in three minutes and the two of you will report to Principle Delmas first thing tomorrow morning before classes start." By now all of the other boys on the level had their doors open, watching closely. He took a step to the side and pointed towards the hallway. Aelita slowly walked away heading back to her own floor.

"Whoo! Go Jeremie!" She could hear Odd yell from her right. She snapped her head towards him and Ulrich who were peeking out from their room and glared at the jokester. Odd raised his eyebrows before slinking back into the room. Ulrich just flashed an apologetic smile and followed the boy in.

Seeing Aelita leave the double doors and head towards the stairwell, Jim turned back to Jeremie. "A word of advice, next time you want to meet with your girlfriend after hours, make sure the light from your computer screen isn't lighting up the entire hallway. Now back to bed, Belpois, or I'll add writing a paper onto your punishment."

"Do you have the authority to order students to write papers?" Jeremie asked raising an eyebrow.

"Yes." Jim nodded.

"Really? But you're our P.E. instructor. You don't issue papers." Jeremie countered.

"Uh...well...okay, fine. Actually, I don't really know. I threaten it all the time, but I've never been called on it before." Jim said honestly. "But...uh...you won't tell anyone about that will you? A teacher needs to have some leverage. If they find out I don't have that power, they might stop listening."

"I won't tell Jim." Jeremie smiled. "But could you do me a favor? This whole thing was my idea. Just report me and not Aelita. I needed help with some math and even though she told me to wait, I insisted."

"You needed help?" Jim asked skeptically. "Really?"

"I'm 15." Jeremie shrugged. "I can't be expected to know everything." He gave Jim one last pleading look. "Come on, Jim. Just let Aelita off."

Jim's look softened. He looked over his shoulder quickly to make sure everyone had retreated back into their rooms. Once he was sure they didn't have an audience, he turned back to Jeremie. "Ah young love... reminds me of when me and-" He looked down at Jeremie which snapped him out of his daydream. "Never mind." He said clearing his throat. "Rather not talk about that anyway. Fine! I'll do you a favor and leave Stones out of this, but you only get one favor from Ol' Jim! Now get back to bed before add writing a paper to your punishment." He said winking at the younger boy.

"Night Jim. Sorry for the trouble I caused." He said winking back. He closed the door and Jim turned around to leave. When he spun around, he was met with both Herve and Nicolas. They were both pale and coughing regularly.

"Jim," Herve let out between coughs. "We don't feel too good."

"Jesus boys. Cover your mouths!" Jim yelled. "Alright, you two, come with me." He said. He led the two down the hallway with him. From Herve and Nicholas's room, a small gray puff cloud slid out from under the door and floated across the hallway into the next room.

~Principle Delmas's Office~

~7:00 A.M.~

Principle Delmas, a man of about fifty years in and old, in a worn-out brown coat and white undershirt, tapped his pointer irritably on his desk over and over again giving Jeremie, who stood in front of his desk, a disappointed glare. He turned to Jim. "Jim, did you happen to see who the second culprit was?"

"No sir." Jim reported. "They must've heard me coming. By the time I got there, whoever it was, was dashing down the hallway. All I could tell was that it was a girl, from her body type."

"What disappointing news." He said narrowing his eyes. "Jeremie, you've been a student here for over two years now, and you've had very few infractions on your record, and none recently. But the dorms are not co-ed. You know that. And you must know how this looks."

"Yes sir." Jeremie responded simply.

"Then tell me why you were caught mingling with another student after lights out!" He exclaimed. "Kadic is listed among the most respected schools in all of France," Delmas told him. "It took many years of strict routines and hard work to build that reputation, and it's this kind of conduct that can get us removed from that list!" Delmas gave Jeremie another dirty glare. "Now I'll give you one last chance, who was it that you were with?"

Jeremie shook his head. "Sorry Principle Delmas, but I can't sell my friend out to you." He said firmly. "I'll just accept my punishment."

Jean-Pierre leaned back in his swivel chair. "I suppose your loyalty to your friends is in a way respectable, but rules are rules, young man. Now I'm no fool. There's not a doubt in my mind that it was young Aelita you were with. Sadly, with no evidence, it would not be right to punish her. Jeremie, I see no other course of action to take. You are to report to the library immediately after class. For the next week, you will not leave the library, except to eat, sleep, and go to classes. Or..." He said with a smirk, "we can shorten the punishment to just today, if you tell me who you were with last-"

"A week is fine." Jeremie said instantly. "First period starts in an hour and I still haven't gotten ready; may I be excused?" Jeremie asked politely.

"Yes, yes, go ahead." Delmas said waving his hand. "No dilly-dallying either! As soon as that bell rings-"

"I'll be there." Jeremie promised closing the door behind him. Outside the office, he found Aelita waiting for him. She gave him a soft look.

"You didn't have to take the fall for me, you know. I'm just as guilty, I should be punished with you." She turned around and started walking towards the door leading outside. Jeremie easily caught up and fell into step beside her.

"Neither one of us should be punished, we're trying to save the world here." Jeremie whispered. "It's been too long without an attack from X.A.N.A. I have no doubt by the end of the day, he'll launch an attack. If both of us were grounded in the library, there'd be no one to run the supercomputer or shut down towers. This way you still have a spot on the team. You can run the supercomputer and deactivate the towers."

"I can't work the supercomputer like you!" Aelita argued. "I don't know a fraction of what you do. Plus, I'll be busy deactivating towers. I can only launch virtualizations."

"Then that's what we'll have to work with for the time being." He put a single hand on her shoulder. "You're the leader for now. I know you can do it."

"Thanks, Jeremie." She smiled.

He nodded in return. "Meanwhile, since I'm off the team temporarily, I'll keep working with the imprint whenever I can sneak in some time. Jim's never been the most observant person. I should be able to do some work under his nose." Jeremie promised. "Now, come on, the others are probably wondering where we are. If I hurry, I might be able to shower and get everything together with enough time to walk to class with you guys."

"Well, I'll wait with you. That way you can at least walk to class with me." She said happily.

After Jeremie had left the room Delmas slammed his fist on his desk. "I can't believe this! Not just a top student. My top student! He's supposed to be my representative for the quality of students we have here at Kadic, but he'd rather take a weeks' worth of punishment over telling the truth! If Jeremie starts acting out like this, I can't imagine what someone like Della-Robia is up to." He rested his head in his hands.

"Aw, I'm sure it's nothing." Jim said trying to calm the older man down. "You know Jeremie. He doesn't have a rebellious bone in him."

"Then why does he insist on breaking the rules and keeping the identity of his accomplice a secret?" Delmas said annoyed.

"Sir, Jeremie may not be the most athletic person in this school, but I've come to have a respect for him. I have no doubt when I say, whatever he's not telling you about, he's doing so for a good reason." Jim said.

Suddenly, the phone on Principle Delmas's desk went off loudly. The Principle let out an annoyed sigh and grabbed the phone reluctantly. "This is Jean Pierre." He answered. "Ah, Nurse Yolanda, good morning to you, too." He said happily. "...Is that so? ...Well then, we'll just have to relocate the ailed students to the northern auditorium. You should have plenty of room there. Grab what blankets and pillows you can and move them immediately, I don't want this cough taking over my school." He said sternly before hanging up the phone.

"More sick students?" Jim asked. "How many does that make it now?"

"Too many. They've more the doubled the capacity of the infirmary and surrounding area in the last hour alone." Delmas answered. "I was sure we had contained it in time. How it's spreading this hard and fast is beyond me."

"What about the non-affected students? Should we relocate them too to try and prevent any further contamination?" Jim asked.

"No point. At the rate this is spreading, I'm sure at least one of these 'un-affected' students is actually already compromised. Just send anyone who shows any signs of a cough to bunk with the other sick students."

Ulrich, Odd, Patrick, and Emillie were heading to their first class of the day. Odd stretched his arms up into the air and yawned violently. "So," He gargled out through his yawn. "do you think Einstein and Princess are going to be late for the first class of the day?"

"Jeremie? Late?" Patrick asked. "As one of his closest friends, I thought you'd know him better than that." He chuckled. "Jeremie's never late for anything."

"Now that I think about it, Yumi was missing this morning, too." Emilie stated.

"I don't know about Yumi," Ulrich said. "but normally we at least bump into Jeremie during our morning routines, but no one's seen him. That means one of two things. He's either in serious trouble-"

"Or he's off sucking face with Princess somewhere." Odd cut in. He started laughing to himself before feeling a light punch to his shoulder. He turned to find Jeremie half-glaring at him with Aelita right behind him.

"I'll remember that next time you need someone to cheat off of." Jeremie said grumpily.

"Aw, come on Einstein. Don't be like that. You need me for the team. I can't help if I flunk out!"

"More importantly, we have bad news." Aelita said. The two joined the group in walking to the classroom. "Until further notice, Jeremie's out of commission. You can thank Delmas for that."

"Seriously?" Emillie asked. "But isn't he, like, the mastermind of this operation? We'll get toasted without a leader! Patrick and I have never even been to Lyoko and he just severed the head of our team!"

"Cool it, Emillie. Aelita's more than capable of taking over the supercomputer for a while until I can figure a way out of this pickle. Jim caught us working together trying to find out who turned on the supercomputer. I managed to convince him to let Aelita off the hook, but he had to report something." Jeremie explained.

"Did you get any closer to finding out who did it?" Ulrich asked.

"No. I couldn't come up with a single person who would have a motive." Jeremie sighed. "I made no progress whatsoever." The group arrived at the science building and Odd, Ulrich, Emillie, and Patrick filed inside. Before Aelita could enter herself, Jeremie grabbed her arm. "One more thing, Aelita. Whenever you see William next, you need to tell him about the imprint. It's not right for us to keep it from him any longer. Just remember not to mention we think he could've started the supercomputer." Aelita nodded and the two headed inside for their hour of torture.

Odd was the first one to enter the classroom, and what he found shocked him. "Are we early?" He asked. As he looked around he noticed the room was almost completely vacant. There were only three others sat in the room. Sissi Delmas, who sat dead center because she insisted she was the center of attention, the new girl Laura Gauthier, who sat in the front row in order to most efficiently absorb knowledge, and Matthias Burrel, who preferred to sit in the back for fear of getting called on.

"Nope." Ulrich answered.

"In fact," Patrick said looking at his watch. "just a minute more and we'd be late." He informed Odd following the two in. "Which begs the question, where is everyone?" Jeremie, Emillie, and Aelita quickly followed them behind and the six of them took their spots. Window seats at the far-right side of the room. Aelita, Jeremie, and Patrick at one desk, and Ulrich, Odd, and Emillie right behind them.

From the adjacent door, Ms. Hertz, a short woman with gray, frizzy hair, and crow's feet behind her eyes, most likely due to something Odd-related, walked into the room, with surprisingly nothing in her possession. "Well, class, as you may have noticed, I have no lesson plan with me today. Unfortunately, class is cancelled for today."

"Cancelled?" Ulrich asked. "Class is never cancelled! What's going on?"

"Never question a good thing Ulrich." Odd chastised. "Now we get an extra hour to ourselves."

"Odd's right." Emillie said. "Never question a good thing, but this? This is too good to be true. Kadic would have us working through an earthquake if it were legal."

"Now, now, Emillie, the staff here at Kadic deeply cares for our students, and would never endanger you in such a horrible way. Now-" She noticed that behind Odd, who was very indiscreetly celebrating, Jeremie had his hand up, waiting patiently to be called on. "Yes, Jeremie?"

"Ms. Hertz, if you don't mind, why was class cancelled?" Jeremie asked.

Ms. Hertz sighed. "If you must know, it's because there aren't enough of you to teach. Everyone who's currently not in this room is in the infirmary with a terrible cough that seems to have plagued the school. The other grades are in a similar state. Just a few students left unaffected. It's gotten so bad, that they've had to relocate the ailed students to bigger rooms multiple times. I personally believe that I should still be allowed to teach, but the rules are quite clear that a class with under ten students is to be cancelled, as resources are best spent elsewhere."

"Good enough for me!" Odd said. He flipped himself over the desk in front of him and rushed out the front door.

"Odd! Wait up!" Emillie called as he exited the room with Ulrich hastily.

Aelita and Jeremie shared a look. "You think it's X.A.N.A.?" Aelita whispered. Beside them, Patrick laughed.

"It's just a cough, guys. If it was X.A.N.A., why would he go after all these other students and not us? Though I guess if I'd been through what you guys had, I'd be a little paranoid too." He said before he got up and left too. "Just try to enjoy the time off." He called from outside.

"I'm not so sure." Jeremie said scratching his chin. "I'm going to go back to my room and get my laptop. X.A.N.A.'s no stranger to using our weak immune systems against us."

"Right. I'll call the others. Hopefully they haven't been infected as well." Aelita said grabbing her phone. Once the two had gotten back outside the classroom they found their friends standing waiting for them.

"So what should we do with our hour of newfound freedom?" Odd said excitedly.

"Belpois!" A familiar voice boomed. The group saw Jim striding towards them. "Just got word that your class has been cancelled too. That means an early trip to the library for you!" He said. "Let's go."

"Come on, Jim! Class has never been cancelled before!" Jeremie said. "Can't I just enjoy the hour with my friends?" He pleaded. Besides he hadn't gotten to his laptop yet. As everyone was focused on Jim and Jeremie's discussion no one noticed the small, silent, specter appear on the scene.

The specter quickly locked on to Emillie's person and began scanning her. It moved on to Aelita doing the same. Finally, it set its sights on Odd. After a quick scan, it divided itself into two separate specters. They descended quickly one disappearing into Odd's torso the other quickly went to Ulrich.

"Sorry, Belpois, I told you. You get one favor. And you already used it. Now off to the land of reading for you."

Jeremie leaned over to Aelita. "The laptop is under my bed. Go back to my room and check it for me." He slowly stood back up straight. "All right Jim, let's go." Just as Jim and Jeremie took their first step, Odd let out a small cough.

Jim immediately stopped in his tracks. Jeremie stopped as well to see what was wrong. "Did you just cough, Della Robia?" Jim asked turning his head.

"Um... no?" Odd tried, smiling as innocently as he could.

"Sorry Odd, but anyone showing any signs of a cough are to report to the infirmary immediately."

"Come on Jim! I'm fine, seriously! You can't deprive me of an hour with no class! I'll be all by my lonesome and bored out of my mind!" Odd pleaded.

"No buts."

"But it was just one-" Ulrich started before being cut off by a cough of his own. His eyes widened as he realized what just happened. "Oh, come on!" He whined throwing his arms up in the air before coughing again.

"There you go, now you have Stern to keep you company. Now, march off to the infirmary, both of you! They'll tell you where to go from there. Belpois, with me." Suddenly Jim's phone went off. He quickly reached into his pocket and answered it. "Jim." He answered. "What do you mean both of the auditoriums are full?! I got two more right here...Stern and Della-Robia. Yes Sir!" He put his phone away. "When it rains it pours." He cursed. "They just quarantined the last of your classmates. Looks like you three," He said pointing to the remaining Lyoko Warriors. "Belpois," He continued jerking a thumb at Jeremie. "Dunbar, and that new girl Knight are the only students in the entire school who aren't infected! You've been put on lock-down until further notice. Can I trust you to go to your rooms and stay there?"

"Yes Jim." They all said unanimously. Jeremie took a step towards them but Jim put a hand on his shoulder. "Not you, you and I are still heading to the library to carry out your punishment." Jeremie dipped his head in defeat and followed Jim reluctantly.

As the two walked away Aelita turned to the remaining two warriors. "Looks like it's just us now. Emillie call William, Patrick you cover Sam, tell them to sneak away and get to the factory A.S.A.P."

"You sure? It really could be just a coincidence." Patrick said. "It's a cough, no one's in any real danger."

"In my experience, there's no such thing as coincidence. And maybe they're not his target."

"What do you mean?" Emillie asked.

"X.A.N.A. knows what he's doing. I've seen this tactic before. He's whittling us down to only who he needs for his plan." She said. She dashed ahead and signaled for the others to follow. Patrick and Emillie shared a look before shrugging and pulling out their phones. As soon as they dialed their desired numbers, they went after the pink haired girl.

~The Factory~

The elevator halted at the second to bottom floor of the old, abandoned factory. The door slowly opened revealing William leaning against the right wall, and Sam tapping her foot impatiently. The two stepped out of the elevator meeting with the other three present teens.

"Where's Odd?" Sam asked immediately.

"Ulrich and Jeremie?" William added,

"Odd and Ulrich both have that cough that's taken over the school. Jeremie's not coming, I'll explain later. Right now, what's important is stopping X.A.N.A.'s attack." Aelita answered.

"Well at least down here, we can't be infected." Sam said. "Lucky X.A.N.A. didn't get the chance to infect us."

"You're thinking about this all wrong. You're underestimating X.A.N.A. Something we can't afford. X.A.N.A.'s smart. He planned this. He purposely only infected Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich because they're experienced fighters. You three have never been to Lyoko, and most of William's time spent there has been under the possession of X.A.N.A. He needs me because with Jeremie out, I'm the only one who can get us to Lyoko."

"So he wants us because we're new?" Patrick asked. "Because we'll be easier to defeat?"

"Easier to kill, is more like it." Sam said darkly.

"Or he plans to turn us into puppets." William said. "But I'm not gonna let that happen to me again. I've a score to settle."

Aelita eyed the dark-haired boy carefully. "Sam, Patrick, Emillie, get in the scanners. I'll start up the virtualization process once we're ready." Once the three were out of sight Aelita turned back to William. "William, there's something I can't go any longer without telling you. X.A.N.A. hasn't totally left your system. He left a part of himself behind."

"What?" William growled. "You're lying."

"Jeremie and I found it in on the diagram from the scanner on the day we brought you back. He left behind an imprint. Jeremie theorizes it makes you easier to manipulate. Even at his base components, he'd be able to get to you. I'm sorry."

"So, what do we do? You're not just going to leave it there, are you?" William asked angrily.

"Of course not!" Aelita counter feeling slightly offended William would even suggest such a thing. "We were studying it together, when Jim caught us. That's why Jeremie's in trouble, we were looking for a way to analyze it."

"Is it permanent?" William asked.

"I don't know. We've barely made any progress in the analyzation process. It's like sometimes it's active and sometimes it's in hibernation. X.A.N.A. must only activate it at certain times."

William slammed a fist into his hand. "I knew it! I knew I wasn't free! I knew it!" He ranted. "I'll never be free of this jerk. Oh-ho when I see X.A.N.A. I'm gonna-"

"William!" Aelita snapped. "I need you to keep a level head. Those three will get creamed or worse without us. Remember who we're dealing with here. X.A.N.A. took advantage of your brazenness before. He won't hesitate to do it again."

William looked her in the eyes and nodded. "Okay." He took a deep breath. "Okay, I got it. But this conversation isn't over!"

"Of course not." Aelita said comfortingly. "But try to remember where being reckless can get you on Lyoko." She advised. She spun around in Jeremie's swivel chair and scanned the computer screens in front of her. All three scanners were indicating there were heat signatures inside of them. "I'm starting up the virtualization process. Scanner: Patrick, scanner: Emillie, scanner: Sam." Aelita called off.

Below them all three scanners boomed with noise. Patrick, Emillie, and Sam all began feeling the tingling sensation the scans left behind. Their models on the computer screen went from red to green starting from the bottom of their models. "Virtualization." She stated pressing the enter key on the keyboard. After a loud whirring sound coming from below Aelita and William, Aelita started typing once again. "Head downstairs to the scanners, I'm starting up our delayed virtualization." Aelita ordered. "We have to get to Lyoko before anything happens to the others."

William nodded and rushed over the hole and climbed down the ladder as fast as he could. Aelita watched the screen as she typed three, then a zero into the timer. She launched herself off the chair, and rushed to join William by the scanners.

~Lyoko : Desert Sector~

In the middle of a barren wasteland, three forms slowly formed mid-air. The first warrior to fully virtualize dropped harshly from the air landing on his two feet. Patrick opened his eyes slowly before taking in his surroundings. "Whoa. So this is Lyoko." He scratched his head softly before jolting back. He took a look at his hands to find several white bandages wrapped around his palms. He finally took a look at his form. He was dressed in traditional black gi and matching black shoes. Wrapped around his knuckles was a set of golden brass knuckles. He lifted up one leg and found spikes at the bottom of his shoes as well. "Cool." He said examining them. "Not really my style, though."

Behind him Emillie fell down landing on her knees. She pushed off her knee and stood straight up. Her hair was, instead of hanging down as usual, done up in a ponytail. She was wearing a grey futuristic shirt and pants with glowing blue streaks down her shoulders, legs, and one down her chest and back. She instantly could feel something in her hands as well. Something rough. In her hand was a lasso. She lifted it up dragging the end of the ground. "Seriously? Is this supposed to be my weapon? Lame." She said. "Wait a minute..." She began feeling her face. "My glasses! Where are they?!"

"This is a virtual world. You probably don't need them." Sam said. Patrick and Emillie turned around to see Sam grinning back at them cockily. She was covered from the neck down in a blue, form fitting suit of armor and the other two new Lyoko warriors could clearly see a black shirt showing underneath from her neck. In her left hand she held a decent sized shield. The shield was decorated in black and blue banners and a design of crossed swords on the front. All she was missing was the helmet and she'd be just like a real knight. "I could get used to this." She said clenching her free fist in front of her. "I've never looked so badass!"

Suddenly a quadrupedal creature came scurrying towards the three rookies. "What's that ugly thing?" Emillie asked pointing ahead at the creature. It came to a stop in front of them and lifted up its front to legs, resting back on its two remaining knees, revealing two cannons at the sole of its foot.

Patrick quickly noticed the insignia on its head. "That's the sign of X.A.N.A.!" He said raising his fists. The creature's feet began glowing red as he pointed the cannons at Patrick.

"Look out!" A stray pink ball of energy flew past the three, just narrowly missing Patrick and colliding with the X.A.N.A. sign on the creature's face. It let out a screech of pain before falling backwards. Milliseconds after hitting the ground, it exploded in a flurry of pixels. Patrick, Sam, and Emillie turned to see Aelita and William behind them.

Aelita was in her old battle angel suit from what she thought were her final days as a warrior. Complementary pinks all across her suit with a dark pink sleeves and fingerless gloves and keeping with the theme; pink face paint. The only think on her that wasn't pink was her blue transparent skirt. William was sporting a black suit with red spiked shoulder and knee pads. Slung over his shoulder was an overly thick Zweihander with a long blue hilt. Most peculiarly, a small black ovular shape seemed to be sticking off the side of his head.

"Tarantula." Aelita scowled. "One's not too bad, but get surrounded and you'd better hope for a miracle. That had to be a scout, meaning there's more coming."

"Tarantula?" Sam asked. "But it didn't have eight legs."

"And it wasn't hairy." Patrick observed.

"Or really spider-like in any way." Emillie added.

"Odd names them, not me." Aelita defended. "William," She said turning around. "you good?" She asked.

"I guess." William said approaching them. "But what's with my outfit. Why did my look change but yours didn't?" He asked rubbing his wristbands.

"Well, you spent most of your time here being all dark and broody. So it makes sense that your suit would reflect that. Give it time. You'll come to like it." Aelita told him. "Now let's see what we have to work with." She looked at Emillie, Sam and Patrick. "Alright. Lyoko weapons work in strange ways. You somehow always end up with weapons you know how to use or will be able to learn to use very quickly. Just try them out and you'll get the hang of it in no time."

"Thank God for that, because I think X.A.N.A. might be a little mad about his 'scout'" Sam said pointing ahead. Off in the distance a flurry of Tarantulas, Crabs, and a Sciphizoa were heading our way.

"That's a lot of monsters." Emillie said worriedly. "What do we do?"

"Fight." William said brandishing his sword in front of him. "A good rule of thumb is the aim for the insignia. Oh. And don't get hit. It hurts."

"What extensive training." Sam deadpanned. As three stray lasers from angry Tarantulas came hurdling towards Sam, William leaped in front of her, holding his sword in front of him. He swung his sword around deflecting each laser easily. He locked eyes with the Tarantula. Glaring fiercely, he launched his Zweihander from his grasp forward as hard as he could. The sword collided with the insignia on the Tarantula's face causing it to stagger backwards before exploding. "Less sass, more butt-kicking." He held his hand out in front of him and in a flash of light, his sword had returned to his grasp. "Unless you want to get de-virtualized."

"I can take care of myself." Sam defended.

William raised an eyebrow and stepped away from her. "Prove it." He challenged. Sam nodded. She held her shield in front of her and charged forward towards a Crab. The Crab fired two shots. Sam easily blocked the first one with her shield, but the second, and more powerful, one knocked her onto her back.

"C'mon Rookie! You're going to have to do better than that!" William called. He rushed ahead sliding onto his knees. He outstretched his sword, severing two of the Crab's legs. It fell cephalothorax first onto the ground revealing its weak spot to everyone. William stabbed his sword's tip into X.A.N.A.'s mark. As he pulled his sword back out the Crab let out a screech before dying in a flurry of pixels. "The last laser they fire is always the strongest." William said.

Meanwhile Aelita, Patrick, and Emillie had their hands full as well. Patrick effortlessly uppercut a Tarantula, hitting the insignis and destroying it instantly. "Too easy." He quipped. From his side an angry Block rammed into him forcing him to the ground. Two Crabs stepped over him readying lasers to finish him off.

"Patrick!" Aelita called. She fired off an energy ball at one of the Crabs, destroying the one on the left.

"Thanks, Aelita, but I think this one's still angry!" Patrick cried. He scurried backwards on the ground trying to escape the monster. Suddenly, a rope whipped past him and wrapped around the Crab's leg. Patrick turned his head to see Emillie holding her lasso with both hands in front of her. She used all of her strength to pull back, causing the Crab to lose its balance. It fell right beside Patrick who smirked. He stabbed his brass knuckles into the crab beside him. As it exploded. he rose back to his feet. "Thanks for the save girls. That was pretty impressive. You grow up on a ranch or something?"

"No. I've never even held a lasso before today." Emillie admitted. "I just knew." She shrugged. Suddenly, she was hit in the back by a single laser, knocking her to the ground. Aelita and Patrick turned to find two more Crabs and the Schiphizoa looming over them.

"Emillie get up!" Aelita yelled. "You two take care of the Crabs! I'll keep the Schiphizoa busy!"

"Is that wise?" William called over. "You know what that thing does!"

"Better me than them! Besides, it has to catch me first!" She called back firing two shots at the Schiphizoa. The squid like creature easily dodged both shots and launched two long tentacles towards the pink haired girl. She ducked under the first one before jumping over the second. "Don't worry about me! Fight!"

Emillie and Patrick nodded turning their attention to their new targets. Emillie jumped straight up into the air landing on top of the Crab gracefully. "Woah... what was that? Some kind of super jump?" She said. The Crab quickly bucked the girl off of itself, launching her to the ground with a thud. It turned clunkily and charged up a laser. Emillie, still stunned on the ground opened her eyes slowly just in time to catch Patrick hit a weak spot in the Crab's leg causing it to fall over before he delivered the finishing blow.

"Nice." Emillie said staggering to her feet.

"Just returning the favor." Patrick smiled.

"Duck!" Emillie called brandishing her weapon once more. Patrick squatted down quickly cover his head with both arms. Emillie's lasso wrapped around the snout of an aggravated Tarantula. She pulled back pulling the creature face first into the ground. "Now!" With a grunt Patrick kicked backwards connecting the spikes in his shoes with the Tarantula's face. It let out a small cry before exploding into nothingness.

Meanwhile, the Schiphizoa was having a hard time even touching Aelita. She had by now activated her wings and was easily dodging each and every tentacle it threw at her, thank to her increased mobility. It roared and stretched out its two main tentacles splitting them both in half, creating two more appendages.

"Hey Calamari-Breath!" Sam called. "Take this!" The Schiphizoa turned to see the knight charging towards it. She launched her shield like a disc as hard as her virtual body would let her. It spun around rapidly. Once it had reached the Schiphizoa it curved up its flight pattern slicing off the ends of the creature's tentacles as it went on. Like a boomerang it glided back into Sam's hands, who caught it effortlessly. "How do you like that?!" She gloated.

The Schiphizoa did a split-second scan of the girl. It quickly regenerated its tentacles with a burst of light, before knocking Aelita, who was distracted by Sam, out of the sky. She plummeted down towards the ground, landing harshly on her stomach. It turned around to fully face Sam. Sam narrowed her eyes and held her shield out in front of her in a ready stance.

"Sam, wait!" William called rushing towards her. Before he could reach her the Schiphizoa fired off a laser knocking the boy onto his back. It swarmed its many tentacles around Sam, who desperately cut off as many as she could manage. The Schiphizoa was too fast, however and managed to get two tentacles on each side of her head. Sam's eyes slowly rolled back as the creature lifted her of the ground. She dropped her shield as her arms limped to her side.

As Patrick finished of the last of the Tarantula's, he turned around to celebrate. "Sam!" He called. "Emillie, we have to help Sam!" He called.

"On it." Emillie nodded. She only got to take a single step before a new feeling was sent through her body. A numbness she had never felt before. She looked down to see a Crab leg sticking out through her now disappearing torso. "Uh, Patrick?"

Patrick turned around just in time to see the last of Emillie's head disappear. "Oh, Come on!" He cursed. The Crab took a few steps toward him. He looked over his shoulder to take a quick look at Sam. 'If I get de-virtualized, then there's no way I can help her. Better finish this one fast.' He thought to himself.

Aelita and William slowly came to. William got back up to his feet and spotted the Schiphizoa holding Sam. "No." He sprinted forward. The Schiphizoa seemed to noticed him and fired off a few shots to slow him down. William just rolled forward past them before jumping up in the air closing the distance between them. The creature fired off one last shot, hitting William in the shoulder. William felt a sting of pain in his shoulder but pushed on. As he descended, He held his sword out, slicing off the main two tentacles and freeing Sam from its grasp. Both warriors fell to their knees and the Schiphizoa staggered back. "You're not doing that to anyone else, you slimy little-"

"William!" Aelita called. "You okay?"

"Yeah, but we only got a couple seconds before it regenerates again. Take Patrick and Sam and find the tower!" He spun his sword around in front of him before resting it on his shoulder. "I'll keep the Squid busy!"

"I can't leave you alone with that thing! What if he gets you again?" Aelita said.

"No time to argue. Go!" He ordered. The squid-like monsters had finally regained its poise and quickly regenerated its arms again. It shot two tentacles outward aiming for Patrick this time. William quickly cut the two limbs off again. "Go! I can't hold him forever."

Aelita gave him a soft nod and motioned for Sam and Patrick to follow her. The Schiphizoa moved to the left in an attempt to get away and follow them, but William cut it off. "Nuh uh." He shook his head. "You and I, round two. Or is X.A.N.A. scared of me?"

~ Kadic Academy: Auditorium~

The auditorium was in chaos. Students that weren't coughing were being carried away by the staff to who knows where. Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich were sitting up against the bleachers, bags under their eyes, and throats that just kept getting sorer by the second. Between coughs Ulrich looked up to see Rosa, who was wearing a face-mask, scoop up an unconscious Milly and carry her away "There... goes... another... one." Ulrich said between coughs, just above a whisper. Any louder and he felt he would ruin his throat forever.

"What's... happening... to... everyone?" Odd asked as Ms. Hertz and Nurse Yolanda carried another unconscious student out.

"They... must..." Yumi started before going into a hard-coughing fit. As she calmed down, she panted heavily. "Exhaustion..." She let out. "Don't... have... long." She said. Her eyes fluttered shut and she fell over onto her side.

"Yumi..." Ulrich panted. Beside him Odd went through another rough fit of coughs. Ulrich rested his head up against the bleachers. "We... have... to... get to... Lyoko. The others-" Ulrich coughed out.

"On it." Odd said softly. He got to his feet, and to his credit managed to stay standing for three seconds. The moment he tried to take a step, the exhaustion overwhelmed him and he flopped onto the floor, out cold.

"Odd..." When Ulrich didn't get an answer, he looked to his left to see Mr. Fumet already gathering Yumi and taking her away. Ulrich's heart was telling him to go after her, but he couldn't muster the energy. He started coughing heavily once again. To his right Odd was being taken away like the others before him.

"Just...resting...eyes..." He said between coughs. Ulrich drooped against the bleachers, unconscious like his comrades.

Principle Delmas came over and picked the boy up. He shook his head in worry, and brought the boy to where the others were being held. Outside an ambulance waited with its back doors wide open. Delmas approached the vehicle quickly. Inside was three pews full of students. All of which were out cold, only being held up by seatbelts and the first responders inside the ambulance. Delmas set Ulrich in the only remaining seat and buckled him in. He carefully closed the back doors and reached the driver's side door. "You're full back there." Delmas told the driver. "Thank you again."

"Just doing my job." The ambulance driver responded.

As the ambulance sounded its siren and bolted off, Jean Pierre joined the other teachers back at the auditorium. He spotted Hertz, Fumet, and Rosa all standing together and went to join them. "The ambulance was full." He told them stopping beside Ms. Hertz. "Any unconscious students will just have to wait for the next one to get here."

"That'll be the third one." Mr. Fumet said. "Maybe we should just cut our losses and submit every student to the E.R. Something serious is obviously going on here! And where is Jim?! He should be here."

"He's watching Jeremie. We caught the boy breaking the rules last night and-"

"You're carrying out a punishment? Right now? Now is hardly the time! We should be sending the students home, not punishing them!" Rosa raged.

"...Maybe you're right." Delmas admitted. "Recall the remaining uninfected students and have their parents pick them up immediately."

"I must disagree. Sending them home would be a mistake. At least with them here the cough is contained. Sending them to the E.R. is one thing but sending them home would only cause a real epidemic. They could infect their siblings or their parents and soon it would spread to all of Bordeaux." Ms. Hertz argued. "We should keep them here until the hospital gets back to us."

"So we have one move to send them home, and one move to keep them here? How to decide?" Delmas said scratching his chin.

"Hard time?" Michael, the groundskeeper, asked. "Then do I have good news. You don't have to choose because those scoundrels aren't in their rooms! Both floors are deserted."

"Where could they have gone?" Rosa asked.

"We need all the help we have here. The only person left is Jim, but he's watching-"

"Priorities, Mr. Delmas!" Ms. Hertz scolded.

~Kadic Academy: Library~

Jim was sitting at his usual desk he sits at whenever he has to carry out punishments, reading his favorite comic series. Jeremie was pretending to do math homework he had actually finished in the first five minutes he had been incarcerated there. In reality, he was doing calculations on William's implant on paper since he didn't have his laptop.

Jim was just about half-asleep with his comic over his head when- 'Jim!' A voice called from Jim's lap. 'Jim!'

Jim picked up the walkie from his side and held it out in front of him, Jeremie raised an eyebrow and briefly stopped his work to listen in. "Mr. Delmas? Is something wrong?" Jim asked.

'The remaining students aren't in their dorms! We need you to go look for them and bring them back! Everyone else is in the auditorium working with the sick kids!' Delmas's voice ordered. 'Now! Forget Belpois for the time being, just lock him in there and get going!'

"Yes sir!" He said jolting out of his seat. He pocketed his walkie and gave Jeremie a stern look. "Sounds like you'll have some company here in detention, Delmas has ordered me to go look for your friends, you stay here and study." He said pointing to the table.

"Wouldn't I be better off helping you find them? They're my friends, after all. No one knows them better than me." Jeremie said.

"Yes...I mean no!" Jim stuttered. "You aren't fooling anyone, young man." He said. "You'll stay here whether you like it or not." He said. "I'm locking you up and throwing away the key!"

"Damn." Jeremie said burying his head in the book and scribbling something down. Jim smirked in triumph and exited through the front door. Jeremie listened for the sound of the lock clicking and as soon as he heard it, he slammed his book down and jumped over the library table. He put an ear up to the door and listened as Jim's footsteps got quieter and quieter.

He looked to the bookcase next to him and ran his hand against it. "Real oak. Good." He found a small divot in the wood work and carefully pulled down tearing off two big slivers of wood. "I love it when they forget how smart I am." Jeremie gloated. He stuck the two slivers inside the keyhole and started jerking them around. He heard a soft click from inside and gave the door a light push. I creaked open and Jeremie did a quick check. "No one around." He took off down the hallway leading to the back door out.

~Lyoko : Desert Sector~

William cartwheeled out of the way from another one of the Schiphizoa's tentacles. He swiped up chopping the next one coming at him in half. "I hope they've found the tower." He panted "Because I think I'm going to pass out." He panted. "I'm way out of practice with you." He said looking up to the Schiphizoa. "One last shot." William swung his sword back like a golf club and swung forward holding it at his feet for a few moments.

As he finished his swing, a wide, powerful slash was sent hurdling towards the Schiphizoa, who fired three lasers in return. The Attack connected head-on with the Schiphizoa, and William, to drained to dodge took all three lasers to the chest. The Schiphizoa exploding caused William to be de-virtualized happily. He smiled as he became nothing but pixels in the desert air.

~The Factory~

The doors to Scanner two flung open, and a tired William fell out limply onto the cold floor. "Ow." He said in a muffled voice. William looked up from the floor and found himself alone in the scanner room. "I forgot how much that process takes out of you." He groaned getting to his feet. "Emillie?" He called. "Must already be upstairs."

He quickly climbed up the stairways through the small hatch above him. William's head poked up out of the hatch. In front of him Emillie was watching the computer intently. "Emillie?"

Emillie turned around to face William. "William. I saw you get de-virtualized." She said.

"You can make out that mumbo jumbo on the screen?" William asked.

"It's not hard to figure out that when your character card disappears, you've been de-virtualized." She said smugly. "So what happened to you?" She asked.

"Schiphizoa and I had a face off." William replied. "We took each other out, but hopefully I managed to buy Aelita enough time to get Sam and Patrick out. They should be at the tower by now, but there's no way for us to tell for sure without Jeremie."

Behind them the main doors to the computer room dethatched and slowly spread apart revealing a panting blonde boy holding himself up against the wall. "Then... it's a good thing... I'm here now." He said between breaths.

"Jeremie?" Emillie asked. "But I thought you were grounded with Jim?" Emillie said.

"He's... never been the best... at keeping an eye on things." Jeremie let out one final huff before recomposing himself. "He got called to search for you guys after the found you left your dorms. I just had to wait until the coast was clear, pick the lock, and beat him here." Jeremie explained approaching his chair.

"And the others? Has anything happened to them?" William asked.

Jeremie jumped into his seat. "From what I gathered on my way here, over half the remaining student body has been sent to the E.R. from extreme exhaustion."

"So... a little rest and they'll be better?" William asked.

"If we deactivate the tower, yes." Jeremie answered while typing on the computer. "If not, it's likely X.A.N.A. will keep the attack going until they lose all of their stamina and die from the exhaustion." He put his headset on. "Aelita, can you hear me?"

'Jeremie?' Her voice sounded in his ear. He smiled. 'What... How are you talking to me?'

"Same as always. The headset. You didn't think I'd really leave you guys all alone on this mission, did you?" He asked happily. "Now I've got good news and bad news. Which do you want first?"

'What's wrong?'

"What's wrong is that Odd, Ulrich, Yumi, and possibly the entire student body are dying from exhaustion, but luckily you're coming up on the activated tower. Get in, do your thing, and everything'll be fine."

'Sounds great,' Aelita answered. 'but I'm picking up vibrations. Vibrations I've never felt before. Something's here. Something bad.'

"I don't see anything irregular on the screen." Jeremie said leaning forward. "Are you sure?" He asked. "This is your first time on Lyoko in a while, after all."

"Maybe they're cloaked from your computer." Emillie offered.

"Maybe..." Jeremie said scratching his chin. "Wait!" He yelled. "I see it. In front of the towers."

XXXXX

Aelita, Sam, and Patrick skid to a stop. In front of them was a giant cylindrical building covered in a red aura. None of that really surprised them what did was the two creatures seemingly guarding the tower.

Both creatures were virtually identical. About twice the size of the Tarantulas and ironically much more spider-like. Standing on six spiked legs, the majority of their body was covered in black plated armor. There was a good-sized turret on the underbody of the thorax of the monster. Dead-center of the body and the only thing not covered in armor, was a sliver of what looked to be glass. No insignia to be found.

Aelita looked to the left and found two large rocks. She pushed both Sam and Patrick down behind the rocks before ducking behind them herself. "Those must be the cause of those vibrations." Aelita surmised while scanning the two creatures. "We've never seen these before." She said turning to her two escorts. "Keep your distance."

"We don't have time to be careful! The others are dying!" Sam snapped brandishing her shield once again. She rolled to the left revealing herself to her enemies. She pushed off with her feet and started towards the two new monsters.

"Sam, wait!" Patrick said. He was about to go after her but felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Aelita holding him back.

The one on the left didn't even react to Sam, seemingly not threatened. The one she was closest to locked onto her with its turret. With a single second of warm-up, a bright white laser shot from the turret and smacked into Sam, knocking her all the way back to the rocks where her friends were hiding. Aelita grabbed Sam quickly and pulled her back into cover.

"That's why we do things my way." Aelita said seriously.

'Sam!' Jeremie's voice chastised around them. 'That was reckless! Your down to only one life point!'

"Life point?" Patrick asked. "What's that?"

'You didn't explain life points, Aelita!?' Jeremie's voice boomed.

"Jeremie, I've been a little busy!" Aelita shot back. "We were attacked no sooner than we got here! Obviously, they only got the abridged version."

'It's exactly what it sounds like. As you've no doubt noticed with Emillie and William, you're not indestructible in this world. Everyone starts out with one hundred life points, once you hit zero, you're dev-virtualized.'

"Kinda like that card game, you like?" Patrick asked.

'Yeah except losing life points is extremely painful. I previously thought that life points were taken out in values of ten, but if Sam has only one life point left, my hypothesis must have been wrong this whole time.'

"We can discuss that later." Patrick and Aelita were both surprised to see Sam get back to her feet. "Right now we need to destroy those monsters!" She grunted.

"Maybe you should let me and Aelita handle them." Patrick offered. "After all, that was quite a hit you took."

"No way. I'm the only one with a shield!"

"In case you didn't notice, that shield didn't help at all." Aelita intervened. "But Sam's right, all three of us will handle this. We just need to work smarter, not harder. Sam's got one life point, and Patrick still has most of his, so Sam will distract those things for as long as she can, while Patrick tries to find a weak spot. If they're agents of X.A.N.A. then they have to have the marking somewhere. I'll sneak into the tower while you guys keep them busy. Ready?" Both of her escorts nodded. "Go!"

Aelita and Patrick quickly exited from one side of the rock, while Sam left cover once more from the other side, this time moving much slower. She felt something in the back of her head, she didn't know what, but it was telling her there was something more to her shield. She took a couple more steps forward. "Hey! Charolette! Over here!"

~Kadic Campus: Forest~

Jim had checked the entire campus and found no trace of Aelita, Patrick, William, Sam, or Emillie. They all lived on campus, so they couldn't have gone home. It baffled him how he was being outwitted by five adolescents, most of which normally can't stay quiet for five minutes. So how were they hiding so well?

The only place he hadn't checked was the outer parts of the forest. He was jogging just fast enough to not tire himself out. Lucky he was a gym teacher, he can have this area searched in no time. "Where the hell could those kids have run off to?" He slowed down to a halt in a small clearing. In the center of the clearing was a manhole. "Could they have gone into the sewers?" He suddenly fell backwards onto the ground and his eyes opened wide.

He was having some sort of vision. He could see himself hiding in the bushes that were supposed to be right behind him. He was staring at Odd and Ulrich uncovering the manhole.

'You sure we weren't followed, Odd?' Ulrich had said.

'Hey I told you I'd make sure of it, didn't I?' Odd sassed as Ulrich descended down into the sewers.

As Ulrich disappeared from Jim's sight, his voice echoed through the hatch. 'Yeah. That's exactly why I'm worried.' Ulrich snarked. Odd quickly followed Ulrich down and covered the hole up above him.

'Oh, wow. They're going into the sewers.' He could hear himself say. 'Hey, do you read me?' He called into his collar.

'Loud and clear.' Suddenly he was surrounded by to men in black he could swear he'd never seen before.

Jim suddenly sat back up in a shock as he let out a heavy breath. "What the heck was that? ...Must be some hallucinatory plants somewhere around here." He guessed. "I've definitely never seen those two men before."

'Jim?! Have you found the students, yet?' Jim could hear.

He looked to his waist and grabbed the walkie talkie, bringing it up to his mouth. "Sorry, Principle Delmas. I checked the entire schoolgrounds already. Right now I'm in the forest, and I might have found a lead."

'Forget it.' Delmas's distorted voice ordered. 'This is a waste of time. We'll just wait for them to get back.'

~Bordeaux Central Hospital~

In the Central Hospital's emergency center, a long line of students was lined up, each on a small bed and hooked up to various heart scanners. Coughing could be heard all throughout the room as an army of students were beginning to either worsen or lose their stamina. Dead center of this line, lay Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi, side by side as always.

"This is insane! I've never seen a simple cough have such devastating effects before." One of the doctors exclaimed. "How is it draining their energy so fast?!"

"A new strain perhaps?" His assistant suggested.

Down the line from the warriors, loud beeping sounds started up. Ulrich weakly turned his head to see Herve and Nicholas's machines going haywire. Two doctors wearing large facemasks came running in. "Just as we suspected!" One of them exclaimed. "We're starting to lose the first of the infected students!"

"Get me Dr. Kasal in here right now!" The other one ordered.

From the other side Yumi frowned. "It's starting. I can feel it..." She said hoarsely. Seconds later, her machine starting sounding off just like the others.

"Yumi!" Odd and Ulrich exclaimed as loud as they could.

"We need another one over here. Patient Ishiyama is losing it too!" A third doctor yelled.

~Lyoko : Desert Sector~

As Aelita, wings out, attempted to fly around the skirmish. The second monster took notice of the angel-girl and started firing a barrage of lasers her way. "Woah!" She said, descending down below the laserfire.

'Aelita! Are you okay?'

"I'm fine Jeremie! I'm a veteran, remember?" She said. "I can handle this!" She said firing off and energy orb at the spider-like monster. It collided with the side of its body making it stumble a bit before resuming fire.

Meanwhile, Sam was easily blocking the smaller lasers, but she still felt like there was something more. Sam decided to go with her gut feeling. She held her shield above her head and it glowed a neon green. "Come on..." Suddenly a small, green, transparent field expanded from her shield and surrounded her person and a six-foot radius. Suddenly, she couldn't even feel the lasers. "Cool." She smiled. "Patrick! I got this one occupied! You get that one off Aelita!"

He looked back at her and nodded. "Hey!" Patrick yelled. The creature turned its attention from Aelita over to the boy who was currently mid-air and descending towards it. It moved to the side away from Aelita and changed its target to Patrick rapidly firing four more lasers off. Patrick ducked under the first two before lifting his arm up to dodge the third. The fourth hit him in the chest and he landed on top of the creature with a thud.

'Patrick, you're down to twenty life-points! Be careful!' Jeremie's voice echoed.

Patrick groaned and quickly pushed back up to his knees. "No worries cuz. I'm fired up now!" He looked down at the top of the spider as it tried fruitlessly to buck him off. "Nice try." He quipped. "But I happen to have a supernatural sense of balance, X.A.N.A.!" He looked around for the weak spot to exploit but couldn't see anything among the pitch-black armor. The only other spot was a small crack in the armor with showing a piece of glass underneath and-

"Hey I found the sigil!" He exclaimed dropping back down to his stomach. X.A.N.A.'s monster still wouldn't stop shaking its body around vigorously in an attempt to get the boy off. "It's under the armor! There's this glass pod and...wait..." He squinted and leaned forward more to make sure he wasn't seeing things.

'What is it Patrick?' Jeremie's voice called.

"There's somebody in there! Inside the creature!" He exclaimed getting to his feet. "Sam, come see this!"

Behind him, Sam dropped to her knees in tiredness. The force field around her slowly retracted into her shield, which fell to the ground with a clang. She looked up quickly to see one final laser coming at her. Before she could get up to move, the laser connected with her chest. Patrick looked back down to find her virtual body quickly disappearing.

"Sam!" Patrick yelled. With Sam gone, both monsters turned their attention to Patrick. The first of the two finally succeeded in wrestling Patrick off of it. Patrick fell back, landing on his feet and skidding back a couple feet. "Jeremie! I don't think I can deal with both of these things all on my own!" He ducked below another incoming laser.

'You don't have to. Sensors indicate Aelita's inside the tower.' Jeremie responded. 'You've done your job. Time to bring you home'

~Bordeaux Central Hospital E.R.~

The last of Ulrich's strength was being used to cover his ears as more than ninety percent of all the machines surrounding him were going off with emergency warnings. To his right two doctors were attending to an unconscious Yumi. On his left Odd was in the exact same situation.

"Damn it! We're losing her!" One of the doctors tending to Yumi cursed.

"What's even left to try?!" The other countered. "Nothing's working!"

"Yumi..." Ulrich said weakly.

~Lyoko~

Aelita quickly ascended up through the activated tower passing many lower platforms. As she reached the top, she did a single graceful flip before landing on the top pad. She quickly approached the center and found a familiar red panel in front of her.

Outside Patrick was doing his best to fend off the giant monsters but he was running low on energy as well. He ran forward one last time rearing back his brass knuckles, but before he could reach the monster on the left, both creatures opened fire on the boy. He jumped backward, narrowly avoiding the laser but got hit by a second laser square in the chest. He slowly faded away like the others before him.

Aelita rested her hand on the panel in front of her. It let out a burst of light, the red glow of the panel melting away, leaving behind a blue tint. She finally pulled back her hand and placed her index finger on the screen. After a few second the screen began to react, automatically typing out 'Code: Lyoko'. All around her the data that filled the tower descended into the depths of the tower below her. "Tower deactivated." Aelita said. "Bring me home Jeremie."

~ Bordeaux Central Hospital~

In just a single second of time, the machines lined up across the room stopped their incessant beeping. In that same exact moment, all of Ulrich's energy came rushing back to him. The various doctors stood in amazement, murmuring queries of what was happening as Ulrich sat up slowly in his bed and looked to his left. Odd was slowly coming to as well. All around them, their classmates seemed to be having similar experiences. No sooner as Odd was up, could he hear everyone around him yelling questions, cheers, and worries. The doctors were doing their best to calm the students down, but there were just too many.

Ulrich layed his eyes on Yumi. Unconscious on her bed. Ulrich got up out of his designated bed and rushed over to Yumi. He pushed the doctor out of his way and kneeled down to the girl's side. "Yumi!" He said resting his hands on her shoulders. "Yumi!" He said shaking her gently. "Wake up!"

"Young man," The doctor tried intervening. "I don't think that's the wisest-"

"Shut up!" Ulrich shot back at the adult. He smiled gently. "I think she's finally coming to." He said.

He and the doctor behind him watched intensely as Yumi's eyes fluttered open. "Ulrich?" She groaned. "Where are we?"

"Yumi!" He cried jumping onto her bed and tackling her in a hug. "You had me going there for a second!" He laughed.

"Amazing." Dr. Kasal said watching the teens. "All of their strength came back already? What is going on?"

"Why can't you always be this affectionate?" Yumi asked dryly. She looked up to see Odd standing over them and smiling.

"I'm alive too!" He beamed bending over. "Let's make things awkward! Group hug!" He said joining the other two's embrace. "Looks like the newbies pulled through, huh?" He whispered.

"Yeah." Ulrich whispered back. "But we should still rendezvous with them. Just to make sure X.A.N.A. didn't procure another puppet out of someone."

"You're worried about William, aren't you?" Odd teased.

"Aaaaand...hug's over." Ulrich hissed pushing Odd away. He stood back up straight and offered Yumi a hand. She happily took it as Ulrich helped her to her feet.

"Ulrich's right." Yumi agreed. "We need to get to you-know-where and make sure everything's alright." She insisted. "Just because the attack was thwarted doesn't mean we're out of the woods yet."

"Well then, let's go!" Odd said.

Odd was about to dash away when he felt two hands on his shoulders. He turned to two doctors looking down at him. "Sorry, young man. But you're not going anywhere. You still have your cough after all."

"All of our energy's back!" Odd protested. "Isn't that proof enough for you eggheads?!" He said breaking free of their grasp only to be grabbed again. "The cough problem is over with, and I have places to be!"

"And how do you know the problem is gone?" One of the doctors asked skeptically.

"I just do!" Odd groaned still struggling. "In case you didn't notice, it wasn't your fine work that cured us, you have no idea what you're doing!"

"I think I liked him better when he was out of it." One of the doctors holding him back said.

"He gets that a lot." Yumi admitted. "Odd, calm down!" She ordered. "They're just doing their jobs."

"And obstructing mine!" Odd argued. "This is why I hate hospitals!"

"Whatever your job is, it's not as important as ours." Dr. Kasal said firmly. "Now sit back down. The sooner we check you out, the sooner you can do whatever you want."

~The Factory~

Jeremie was sitting in his computer chair, surrounded by everyone once again. Everyone except Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich. He was holding his cellphone up to his right ear with his shoulder while initiating a scan of the new monsters on his terminal. "And that's all we have to report on our end. When are they planning on letting you guys go?" He asked hopefully. "...uh huh. Alright then. We'll see you then I guess. Thanks, Yumi." He hung up, pocketing his phone before swiveling his chair around to face the gorup he had with him.

"Any casualties?" William asked.

"No. They almost lost Herve, Nicholas, and Yumi, but everyone pulled through in the end. The doctors are baffled by the turn of events, though." Jeremie explained. "They're keeping everyone overnight for more tests. Not that they'll find anything. Now that that's all cleared up, I think it's report time. Aelita?" He said turning to the pinkette. "How did it go today?"

"Given it was their first time on Lyoko, I'd say we couldn't have asked for better recruits." She said happily. "A pluses all across the board."

"Really?" Emillie asked. "But I got de-virtualized before you even reached the big bads." She said rubbing her arm.

"And my recklessness kinda sabotaged us too. If I had kept a level head, I wouldn't have needed William to save me from that squid." Sam added lowering her head.

"And I definitely could've done better at keeping my focus on the battle." Patrick finished.

"All very valid criticisms, and things that will be addressed." Aelita admitted. "But...you're missing one big thing, and I'm positive Jeremie'll back me up on this. In the fight against X.A.N.A. there are many things we need to teach you three, but you instinctively knew the first and most important rule: look out for each other."

"Well said." Jeremie agreed nodding once. "You can't teach compassion. I'd say we picked the right people to help us."

"Furthermore," Aelita continued. "I move we terminate William's trial period right now. I say he becomes a full-fledged Lyoko Warrior. No more strings. It's not fair to him."

"Sadly, we need to take a full vote to validate it. Without the others-" Jeremie started.

"Jeremie, he stayed behind to fight the Schiphizoa on his own. If that's not loyalty, I don't know what is."

"Still-"

"Do we get a vote?" Emillie interrupted.

"...I don't see why not." Jeremie said shrugging lightly. "You are part of the team now."

"Great, then all we need is a unanimous vote here and... boom! Problem solved." She surmised. "I'll second it."

"Me too." Patrick added.

"After what he did for me, he shouldn't even have to ask." Sam smiled at the dark-haired boy who smiled back.

"That's four." Aelita said. "Jeremie, it's up to you." She said.

Jeremie looked to William and then to his lap. He gave it a quick runthrough in his head. On the upside, from what he's heard, William seems to be much more of a team player this time. And if Aelita trusted him, then Jeremie really should too. On the other hand, one mission isn't much to go on and Aelita could make friends with just about anyone who's willing. She does have a record of being just a tad bit too trusting. "Alright." He finally said looking up. "I vote yes too."

"Yes!" William said happily pumping a fist in the air. "You guys have no idea how much this means to me. I'm finally a warrior for real!"

"But," Jeremie interrupted. "Although the vote has decided your fate. You don't get the title until we've talked to the others first. It's unfair to not at least give them a chance to voice any objections."

William sighed in annoyance. "Fair enough, I guess."

"Good. Because we have much more pressing matters to attend to." Jeremie said spinning his chair back around to face the monitor. "I did a full-scale scan on those new monsters."

"Were you able to find out anything about the people inside?" Aelita asked.

"They're not just any people, Aelita. They're THE people. The ones we're looking for. The armor around those monsters acts as a sort of exoskeleton holding them inside."

"But why?" Emillie asked scratching her chin. "If they're captives of X.A.N.A., why would he put them out in the open like that? It doesn't make any strategical sense."

"Maybe they need a power source to fuel a monster of that caliber." Aelita suggested. "The captives could act as almost an infinite source of energy."

"Maybe." Jeremie said with a hint of doubt in his voice.

"Oh, I know that tone. What're you thinking?" Aelita asked.

"What if these 'captives' aren't really hostages. What if they're willing agents of X.A.N.A.? People who purposely virtualized themselves in order to aid X.A.N.A. in his plans."

"That's ridiculous." Sam interjected. "Why would a human being, the very lifeforms X.A.N.A.'s hellbent on destroying, help X.A.N.A. with his cause. Who would possibly go for that?"

"I don't know. But I've got a bad feeling about all of this. I'll need to do more scans on these monsters. Maybe I can find out something about the captives inside. As if I didn't have enough to do already. Between that damned residual marking and our mystery man, I'll barely have time for class, let alone homework." Jeremie raged.

"Why don't you just check the security tapes?" William asked tilting his head and crossing his arms.

"What?" Aelita asked.

"Security tapes. They're two security cameras down in the basement on both sides of the core of the computer. It had to have caught whoever was meddling down there." William said.

Jeremie's eyes widened and he slammed his head against the keyboard. "I'm an idiot!" His muffled voice called. He lifted his head back up just to slam it against the hard surface once again. "Stupid! Stupid!"

"Jeremie!" Aelita scolded. "Stop that! She said grabbing his head and holding him back.

"Yeah." Patrick agreed. "If we're ever going to pull this saving the world thing off, we need that brain of yours. Aelita instantly gave him the stink eye.

"And," She said clearly annoyed. "I don't want you hurting yourself. What's wrong?" She said concernedly.

"I'm an idiot that's what!"

"Jeremie, you're like the smartest fifteen-year-old ever. What fifteen-year-old understands whatever that dumb cat theory you were trying to tell me about." Patrick said rolling his eyes.

"Schrodinger's cat." Jeremie corrected him. "That's not the point. I've wasted countless hours trying to work out who our John Doe is with no real evidence to go off of, when I could've just checked the security cameras! I'll set up things on the supercomputer. William, Emillie, go grab me those cameras. We're solving this mystery right now."

Once William and Emillie had brought Jeremie the desired cameras, Jeremie pulled a small two-sided cable out from behind the monitor. "Jeremie, what is that?" Patrick asked.

"It's one of his HDMI chords." Aelita said. "He has a habit of hiding them all around any space he constantly occupies in case of emergency." She smiled. "Kind of like a cute little squirrel."

Jeremie cleared his throat in embarrassment. "Yeah, well, it's working out now, isn't it?" He said defensively. He plugged the front end into the back of the monitor and stuck the back end into the small jack in the side of the first camera. The screen lit up with months of footage separated by days. "Let's try exactly one month before school started back up." Jeremie said clicking on the desired day.

A window pulled up on the screen of the basement room that harbored the supercomputer. As of the first fifteen seconds nothing was changing. "I'll try fast forwarding." The group sat in silence as Jeremie sped through the entire first day's footage with no changes. "Guess we'll try another day." The ran through the second day with no luck either.

"Jeremie, I know this is like your forte and everything, but I'm insanely bored. Can we go back to Lyoko and fight some more monsters?"

"You can't go back to Lyoko for another 6 hours. The virtualization process puts too much strain on your bodies. Luckily X.A.N.A. needs time to recharge as well." Jeremie explained going through another days' footage.

"Ugh." She groaned. She sat back against the wall and pulled out her phone. "So much for thrilling training."

Hours passed as Jeremi ran through day after day of storage with Aelita by his side. Emillie and Sam were both sitting up against the wall immersed in their cell phones. Patrick was lying on his back playing on his handheld gaming device. William was the only one on his feet, but also the only one not awake. He was leaned against the wall, arms crossed, and snoring quietly.

"This is the last day." Aelita said. "If we don't find anything on this strip of footage-"

"It has to be here." Jeremie interrupted. "It's the last day that fits the timeline of X.A.N.A.'s activeness."

Patrick sat up and pocket his gaming system. He popped his head up beside Aelita. "So, you've finally found it." He said getting to his feet. "William, rise and shine!" He called behind him.

Both girls got up to their feet and walked to the computer. William's eyes shot open and he staggered sideways with a grunt. "Must have dosed off..."

"Like a horse." Sam commented. "Who sleeps standing up?" She said mockingly.

"Someone who tired himself out saving your butt twice." He remarked back in a snarky tone.

"We're down to the final day that someone could've possibly snuck in here and reactivated the supercomputer." Jeremie informed them. "Just my luck to be the last one we checked." He sped past a couple more hours before abruptly hitting the stop button. "There!" He said pointing to at the paused frame. It showed mostly the same image as before but a single shoe was shown to be entering the room. "Got em'"

"Jeremie...that shoe is-" Aelita put a hand on his shoulder.

"Time to find out who did it!" Jeremie hit the play button aggressively, and narrowed his eyes at the screen. The feed clearly showed a young blonde boy in an auburn shirt and glasses enter the room. "Wait..." Patrick said. "that's-"

"No..." Jeremie said shaking his head. The boy reached out to the lever and grabbed it tightly. Everyone watched in disbelief as he shoved the lever upwards activating lights all around him. The boy on the screen turned his head slightly revealing the true culprit: Jeremie Belpois. The computer zoomed in on the boy's face and began running several scans across his eyes, nose, and cheeks. Everyone stood in silence for a few moments waiting for an explanation from Jeremie. The boy just stared intently at the screen.

"It was you!" Emillie finally said pointing at Jeremie. "You did it!"

"Gotta be a trick by X.A.N.A." Patrick guessed. "Faked footage doesn't sound too out of the realm of possibility."

"Facial recognition begs to differ." Emillie said motioning the flashing green circle. "It seems pretty insistent that that's the real Jeremie!"

"You can't be serious." Aelita deadpanned.

"X.A.N.A. wouldn't have had enough power to create a specter." William added. "Nor to possess someone. That has to be Jeremie. Which raises the question; why'd you do it?" He said glaring at the boy.

"Someone with a background in programming..." Jeremie realized. "No one's a better programmer around here than me." He said softly.

"Jeremie, stop that!" Aelita ordered. "Jeremie's our leader. He would never willingly endanger any of you."

"That's clearly him!" Emillie accused. "He set this all up." She said softly.

Jeremie got up slowly and made his way to the ladder leading to the scanners, with his head hung low. "Jeremie!" Aelita called. "Where are you going?"

"Emillie's right. Facial recognition says it's me and this is grounds for expulsion from the group. I can't be here while you vote." He said dejectedly climbing down the ladder. "Call me back when the decision's made."

"Jeremie, wait!" Aelita called. She felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see William holding her shoulder and shaking his head.

"Maybe it was an accident." Patrick said. "You know, a 'whoops I slipped and flipped the on switch, then tried to cover it up by lying' type of deal." He tried hopefully.

"It looked pretty intentional to me. Maybe someone was missing his glory days as a hero." Sam guessed. "So, he brought back the only thing that could give him that glory."

"Hey!" Aelita snapped. "Don't insult Jeremie's character like that. He would never!" She growled at the girl. "He's done so much to save everyone here from zombies," She said glaring at Emillie. "sinkholes and fault lines," She said turning her attention to Sam. "and X.A.N.A. in general." She said finishing with a glare for William. "He's a hero."

"The one who sits safely at the computer while everybody else risks their hides in Lyoko. Yeah. He's the hero of the group. Is it so hard to believe he's gone bad?"

Aelita took a step toward Sam but was interrupted between her next step by Emillie who blocked her while also holding Sam off on the other side. "Easy, girls." She said. "We've got enough problems."

Sam took a deep breath before backing away. "Then how do you explain it?" Sam asked still heated. "He could just as well be playing you as well. Maybe he brought us all here to offer to X.A.N.A."

"Jeremie's too smart." Aelita argued back just as heatedly. "If he wanted any or all of us handed over to X.A.N.A., we'd be dead by now."

"Could be brainwashed." Patrick guessed.

"Patrick!" Aelita scolded. "Whose side are you on?! That's your cousin!"

"A cousin who's been hiding a secret double life from him." Sam cut in flatly.

"I'm just trying to consider every possibility!" Patrick defended himself. "I don't want to believe he did it!"

"He didn't do it." Aelita said seriously. "I thought that of all people, he could count on his cousin that he speaks so highly of." She huffed. "If Jeremie's out, so am I." Aelita said furiously, refusing to look at any of them. "This whole situation is ridiculous. X.A.N.A.'s up to something and you guys are playing along just like his little puppets."

"I'm no one's puppet!" William shot back. "Not anymore!"

"You say that, but you're sure acting like you're still under his control!" Aelita quipped harshly. "Kicking out Jeremie? Seriously? Do you want X.A.N.A. to win?!"

"I want X.A.N.A. destroyed more than anyone!" William raged. "That's why we have to consider this! He's potentially endangering the mission!"

"Arguing is a waste of time." Emillie said seriously. "We need a vote."

"I have no doubt in my mind that, no matter what evidence is against Jeremie, Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich would side with me and vote to keep him." Aelita said bitterly.

"In any case, they're at the hospital." William said. "We'll have to disregard their votes. There's five of us here anyway. This way there's no chance of a tie. Who wants to start?"

"Easy." Aelita said immediately. "I vote in favor of Jeremie."

"Against." Emillie countered carefully. "Sorry, Aelita."

"Against." Sam echoed.

Everyone turned to Patrick next. He stood in silence for a moment before sighing. "He's still my cousin. For." He said finally. "William?"

All eyes were on William now. "We have to look at this logically. Can we really expel Jeremie? No one can operate the supercomputer like him." William said. "And if Aelita's serious about leaving-"

"I am." She growled at the dark-haired boy.

"We can't deactivate towers without her." William finished. "We at least have a chance at succeeding without Jeremie, but without Aelita, we're destined to fail." He explained scratching his chin. "But we also can't afford to keep Jeremie, if he's somehow working with X.A.N.A. I say we wait for the others. Their input might make up my mind."

"Then we meet here tomorrow morning." Emillie said. "All of us."

"Who wants to break the news to Jerry?" Patrick asked.

"I think it's clear who it should be." Aelita said with a hmph. Everyone gave her a nod and Emillie, Patrick, and Sam made their way to the elevator. Before William could join them, Aelita grabbed his wrist, holding him back. "I expected better of you William." She growled once again.

"Jeremie said it himself. He's the best computer nerd around here. He's studied X.A.N.A. more than anyone. He might even know more about him than the jerks who created him. I just don't see any other way-" William said.

"Jeremie was the one who pushed for you to come back to us. And who was it who found out about your implant, huh William? If not for Jeremie, you'd be unaware of X.A.N.A.'s sick little residue in that thick head of yours!" Aelita snapped forcefully poking him in the forehead. "But a little clip comes your way and you turn your back on him. Maybe I was wrong about you."

"I'm sorry, Aelita." He said tearing his arm away from her. He entered the elevator and turned around to face Aelita while the doors closed.

Aelita climbed down the ladder to the scanner room to find Jeremie curled up against the wall hugging his knees. "Hey." She said giving him a smile.

Jeremie looked up at the pinkette and gave her a weak smile back. "Hey." He said, voice dripping with anguish. "So, what's the verdict."

"Better than it sounds, that's for sure." Aelita said taking a seat next to him. "It was Patrick and I against Sam and Emillie. William reserved his vote until the others can give their input."

"That was pretty incriminating evidence. How'd you pull that one off?"

"Simple. I told them if you were out, so was I. I think that's the only reason William reserved his vote." Aelita said with distain.

"You shouldn't have done that. You know you can't follow through with it. Even if I'm kicked out, you have to fight X.A.N.A. or we all lose." Jeremie said seriously. "We didn't come this far to lose."

"There's no way we can win without you anyway." Aelita said.

"You'd find a way." Jeremie told her. "As long as they have you, there's hope."

"You're far too okay with this situation." Aelita said narrowing her eyes. "Do you even care? I'm trying to fight for you and you sound like you've given up already!"

"Of course I care!" He shot back. "It's just... I don't blame them for not trusting me. I'm not sure I trust me either. I'm a man of logic. Every brain cell I have works by taking what's in front of me and drawing conclusions from that!" He said. "It's good that they're skeptical. We need to consider the possibility that-"

Before he could finish his thought, he was enveloped in a tight hug from Aelita. "Don't even." She said quietly. "I know you're innocent. And I know that Yumi, Ulrich, and Odd do too." She said. "If I had just been able to bring myself to bring up that stupid implant, I could've made a better case for you."

"It's best that you didn't." Jeremie replied. "If you had, the others might turn on both me and William. It's best this way."

"Tomorrow morning, you'll see." She soothed. "The others'll talk some sense into these fools."

~Kadic Academy: Male Dorms~

~Male Dorms~

William lay down silently in his bed, arms relaxed behind his head. The group had just narrowly avoided being found out. Once Jeremie and Aelita caught up with them, Emillie shared the idea of hiding out in the library until someone found them. Once they were caught, they just played it off like they needed some books in order to study. Of course, Delmas bought it hook, line, and sinker. Jim got in a little trouble for doing a 'lousy' job of searching the schoolgrounds. Nobody even knew that Jeremie ever left.

But right now, William had a lot to think about. Jeremie being a possible turncoat was probably the most troubling news he could've gotten besides the fact that X.A.N.A.'s still kicking. Who would've guessed? Even he would've taken the bet that he'd be a turncoat before Jeremie.

None of that matters though. Jeremie turned on the supercomputer. He awakened X.A.N.A. And he endangered everyone. Including William's parents, the two people who mean the most to him. That he couldn't forgive. He'd give Jeremie a chance to explain himself but if he didn't like what he heard... then who knows what might happen.

~The Factory~

~6:00 A.M.~

The many ailed students were all released late the night before allowing for all nine warriors to assemble for their emergency meeting. Most of the warriors weren't even properly dressed. Yumi, and Aelita were the only ones actually dressed for the day. Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich were still uninformed as to why they were meeting up at the factory let alone...

"Why are we here so early!" Odd complained. He had heavy bags under his eyes. And he had been having a yawning fit all throughout the trip to the factory. "I'm running on two hours of sleep here! How am I supposed to be the comic relief without a good night's sleep?!"

"We have to meet before classes start up, Odd." Jeremie explained. "This is too serious to wait any longer."

"We found out who turned on the supercomputer." William explained. "It was in the security tapes clear as day."

"Great!" Odd said "Meeting adjourned. I'm going back to bed." He quickly dropped to the floor and curled up into a ball. "This place could really use a carpet." He mumbled.

"I wasn't done, Odd." William groaned.

"Weird. I am." He yawned once again.

"Forget, Odd." Ulrich said. "There's no reasoning with him when he's tired. But I think I speak for both Yumi and I when I say we want to know who to smash for turning that blasted thing on." He said slamming a fist into his hand. "This has been building up for long enough."

"That's the thing," Emillie said. "It was Jeremie. I don't think you want to punch him." She said seriously. "No matter how stupid he was being."

"I'm telling you it wasn't him." Aelita said. She was starting to remember the feeling of anger she had the evening before. You're the ones-"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Yumi interrupted. "Jeremie? You think Jeremie started the supercomputer? Why on Earth would you think something foolish like that?" She asked almost laughing.

"It may sound silly, but we saw the tapes. Facial recognition software doesn't lie." William said seriously. "Jeremie, will you pull up the video again?" William asked. Jeremie nodded and got into his chair. Aelita swung her head dramatically and went to join him.

"We were in the middle of a vote." Sam explained. "Emillie and I voted against Jeremie and Aelita and Patrick voted for him. William-"

"For." Odd interrupted from the ground.

Sam jerked her head down towards the boy who still refused to open his eyes. "What?"

"I obviously get a vote." He said tiredly. "I vote in favor of Einstein." He said matter-of-factly. He rolled over onto his other side. "Now argue quieter."

"I second that." Ulrich said in a very slightly quieter voice. "For."

"But I didn't even pull up the video." Jeremie said pointing to the computer. "It's clearly me." Beside him Aelita leaned against the swivel chair and smirked cockily. She knew this was coming but that didn't make it any less satisfying.

"You don't have to pull up anything, Jeremie." Yumi said sweetly. "I vote for too." She said looking to the group. With that it's five to a possible four. The vote's finished." She said. "Honestly, three votes against you, Jeremie? Did you really manage to piss everyone off that fast?"

"You didn't see the video." William said. "Even Jeremie said it was him."

"Then Jeremie's not the genius he claims to be." Yumi said teasingly. "Think about it. What's the one thing Jeremie cares about most in this world?" Yumi asked.

"Programming?" Emillie guessed. Ulrich made a generic buzzer noise to answer her guess.

"His reputation as the smartest student to ever come to Kadic?" Sam tried. Another mocking buzzer noise.

"Skipping Gym class?" Patrick asked jokingly.

"Good guess, but..." He gave another buzzer noise shaking his head.

"I can see your having fun making that sound at them, but it's pretty obvious they aren't going to get it." Yumi remarked.

Emillie eyed the two. "Are you gonna tell us the answer?" She asked.

"Easy. It's Princess." Ulrich said pointing to Aelita. "He doesn't have it in him to do anything that would threaten her life. Except for that one time he was possessed by X.A.N.A., that is." Ulrich shrugged. "I don't know what you're seeing on that tape, but Jeremie and Aelita obviously forgot to teach you lesson number one in X.A.N.A. warfare."

"Everything is often not what it seems." Yumi finished for him. "It's not impossible for X.A.N.A. to infect the footage to turn everyone against Jeremie."

"There'd be an activated tower if that happened." Jeremie explained. "There's no indication of activity on Lyoko."

"So? X.A.N.A.'s hidden activated towers from us before." Ulrich said. "There's something going on here that we aren't aware of. Even if we assume that it really is Jeremie on that tape, there's no indication that it's of his own free will."

William nodded listening to Ulrich's words carefully. The two of them were definitely making good points. Points that he was surprised Aelita didn't lead with. Free will. 'He left an imprint behind.' Aelita's words rang in his head. 'Even at his base components,' Then it hit him.

"You said Jeremie was X.A.N. ?" William asked suddenly. "If that's true, then X.A.N.A. would've never missed the chance to imprint our leader. Especially when that leader has full control over the supercomputer when we're on Lyoko, right?"

"The Hell are you talking about?" Ulrich asked eyeing the dark-haired boy. "What the Hell is an implant?" He turned to Jeremie. "Einstein?"

Jeremie let out a sigh of relief. 'They finally figured it out,' He thought to himself. "There's something that I've been keeping to myself. I kinda only told Aelita." Jeremie confessed. "When we re-examined William's charts from the day we brought him back, we found a small piece of residue. It's a bit of X.A.N.A.'s code." Jeremie explained. "I think it's supposed to give X.A.N.A. an easier grasp over William. Even in his broken state, X.A.N.A. might have still been able to use William."

"And you kept this from us why?" Yumi asked. "This is the second time you've kept a secret from the group, Jeremie." She chastised. "You can't keep doing this."

"Plus, you could've easily dispelled any disbelief on your part by explaining this. You're too smart not to have figured it out on your own. You knew you might have an implant, didn't you?"

"Yeah." He said hanging his head. "I knew. I didn't want to keep it a secret, but I felt like if I told you guys he might be working for X.A.N.A. unknowingly, you might turn on him even though I had no concrete evidence that he had been the one to turn on the computer." Jeremie explained.

"He also didn't bring it up to defend himself because that would put both him and William in danger of being kicked out. Even though there was no proof either had done anything wrong." Aelita spat looking straight at William. "But you couldn't give him the same benefit of the doubt, could you?"

"I... guess not." He admitted. "I'm sorry." He couldn't feel worse at the moment. He so easily turned on the one person who was actively trying to get this sick implant out of his head. Sure, the evidence was stacked against Jeremie, but it wasn't exactly favoring himself and Jeremie never said a word to anyone but Aelita who also told no one.

"This does raise the question of what we're going to do about this whole problem." Yumi said. "Implanting code inside you two is a huge problem. How are we going to combat it? X.A.N.A. could manipulate the two of you at any moment."

"Luckily, I think that he can't give us any trouble while he's recharging from his defeat." Jeremie said. "I was studying the imprint before I got caught. If only I could get out of my punishment. It would be so much easier to study it then. But I can't do that without selling out Aelita." He said sadly. "And if X.A.N.A. attacks, we can't afford to have her grounded in the library."

"So, tell them it was me." William offered. "Aelita'll be off the hook and so will you. The team can survive without me for a couple days, right?"

"I... suppose. But are you sure?" Jeremie said. "Unlike me and Aelita, you have a record a mile long. They won't go as easy on you." He reminded the boy.

"I'm sure. Think of it as atonement. My apology. Besides, it's that same record that'll make sure they believe you when you say it was me. Tell them it was my idea in the first place, too."

Jeremie sighed. "Alright, then before school starts, I'll report to Delmas's office and tell them it was William. Hopefully Jim will keep his mouth shut about it really being Aelita."

"I've been meaning to ask you about that." Aelita said. "How exactly did you convince Jim to let me off the hook. Everyone knows he's never given anyone a pass before."

"I have my ways." Jeremie said smiling at her. "It doesn't matter how. Just that I did it."

~Delmas's office~

~7:00 A.M.~

Jeremie stood in front of Delmas's desk, arms at his side, waiting patiently for the Principal to say something. The elder man was just tapping his fingers on his desk, presumedly processing all of what Jeremie had told him. After William's confession, he was taken to the library with Jim for his punishment. "I must say young Belpois, when you said you would tell me your accomplice, I was quite surprised. You seemed so adamant yesterday morning."

"Yeah, well, when William heard about the harsh punishment I was facing, he decided it'd be best if I just turned him in." Jeremie said. Not a complete lie. "So, am I off the hook?" Jeremie asked hopefully.

"Given William's track record of disobedience, I guess it's not too out of the realm of possibility, but didn't Jim say the person he saw had a female body type?" Delmas asked skeptically. "William is far from feminine."

"It was dark. And late." Jeremie said. "He must have been too tired to see straight. So, are we good, here?"

"Dunbar did confess, so I suppose so." Delmas finally said. "Now hurry off to your friends, young man, I have much work to do. And if I catch you mingling with another student just once more, you won't be given a chance to be let off the hook."

"Yes, sir." Jeremie said. He rushed out the door to meet Ulrich and Aelita waiting for him on the other side. After Jeremie shut the door behind him, Delmas looked down to the piece of paper in front of him. It was just a report that was needed for the records on Jeremie and William's offense.

As he signed it, he shook his head. "For such a brilliant student, the boy is a terrible liar. How little does he truly think of me?" Delmas said out loud. "And it's hardly like William to take the fall for anyone. But if this is how they want it, then so be it. I'll play their game." He set the paper to the side and quickly pulled up Amazon on his computer. On the screen was a page showing off a high-tech security camera. "But I'll be watching much closer from now on."

As Jeremie, Aelita, and Ulrich walked out the double doors leading outside they took a quick detour to the library. "I hate to admit it, but it was really cool of William to take the fall for you, Einstein." Ulrich said.

"Maybe..." Aelita countered. "but that was only after accusing him of being a double-agent." She said bitterly. "It's hard for me to feel bad for him after he turned on us even after all we did for him."

"You have to forgive and forget." Jeremie said. "Both of you. Between fighting X.A.N.A. and keeping up appearances, we don't have time for grudges. Don't forget this won't be the last time X.A.N.A. tries to turn us against each other. Besides, it took some time for us to completely trust each other, too." He reminded them. "You didn't even really like Odd all that much when I brought us together."

"More importantly, we need to find a way to combat your implants. Preferably before X.A.N.A. can use you again." Aelita countered. "We don't even know what he might have done with William already."

"But why doesn't he use you now? Why hasn't he influenced you since the day you turned on the supercomputer?"

"I don't know." Jeremie admitted. "I suppose it's possible he's planning something big, but our best bet is to analyze the implants and figure out a way to disable them as fast as possible."

They came to a stop in front of a windowsill at the library. Inside the could clearly see William relaxed back with his feet up on the table. William opened his eyes and noticed the three of them looking at him. He smiled and gave them a thumbs up before Jim came onto the scene and began scolding the boy for having his feet on the table.


	3. Parental Guidance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ulrich fails another test, tempting Delmas to call his father in for another one-on-one talk and, due to his recent behavior problems, calls Jeremie's father in too. Oh, and X.A.N.A. goes GTA.

~Kadic Academy; Bordeaux, France~

~10:45 A.M.~

It was a bright sunny day in Bordeaux. Yet both Jeremie and Aelita were situated inside firmly at their usual desk, listening to Mrs. Meyer intently as she drabbled on about housekeeping matters. The woman of about forty turned around to face the class of ace students. It was a very advanced math class. Only 10th grade students with honor rolls could even apply, let alone get in. Of course, being two of the brightest students in the school, Aelita and Jeremie had no problem getting in. Familiar faces surrounded them as well.

"As the last bit of housekeeping, I have the results of your second tests for the semester that you finished yesterday." She said grabbing a stack of papers from behind her. "All around, the grades were satisfying. Some of you are just where I expected you to be, and others will need to step it up a bit if you expect to pass." She started making her way around. "I understand this is a hard class, so I get needing a couple weeks to get used to it. Just keep at it, and I'm sure you'll do fine. Once you have your papers, you are dismissed. Now then..." She carefully pulled the first paper off the pile. "Aelita." She smiled at the young girl. "95. You repeated yourself quite a bit, but overall, very well done." She handed the sheet over to the pinkette.

"Good job Aelita." Jeremie complemented. She smiled back and relaxed back into her chair. "Aren't you going to get out of here?" He asked as Mrs. Meyer kept through her rounds.

"Nah." Aelita said. "I'd much rather stick around to see you get the highest score."

"Herve." They heard come from behind them. They both turned just in time to see Herve grab the paper from the elder woman. "93. Answers were correct, but penmanship is a factor, and yours is just atrocious, you know." He scowled and pocketed the paper away into his bag. Mrs. Meyer quickly handed papers to the table right behind Jeremie and Aelita. Mrs. Meyer took a look at the stack in her arm. "Oh! Yes, next we have the highest score in the class."

Aelita elbowed Jeremie with a smirk. Jeremie chuckled and shoved her arm away as the teacher passed the two without so much as glancing their way. Aelita did a double take as Mrs. Meyer stopped in front of the desk behind and to the right of them. "Laura." She said. The blonde looked up at her with pride. "99." Meyer said. "If I could give you a 100 I would, but unfortunately Principle Delmas has restricted us to one 100 per semester in order to urge you to always improve." She said shaking her head. "Sometimes I wonder about that man..."

"You didn't get the highest score?" Aelita whispered to Jeremie. "You always have the highest score!" She looked back to Laura who exited the room with a cocky strut. "Weird." She mused. The teacher stopped in front of Jeremie and Aelita and handed a slip of paper back to Jeremie. "Jeremie. In no way bad, but I did expect a lot more from one of Kadic's top students. 92." She said.

The whole classroom shared a collective gasp. "A... _B_?" A kid behind the two asked. "Belpois got a _B_?!" He began laughing and pounding his fist on the table. "Oh, man." He said wiping away a tear of laughter. "I got a 94! I did better than Jeremie Belpois!"

"Maybe all those days spent around Odd are starting to catch up to him. Like secondhand stupidity."

"Nah." The boy sitting next to him countered. "Check him for nuts and bolts. I bet he's one of Belpois's experiments. Made so he can skip class."

Aelita quickly turned around. "He's not a robot." Aelita deadpanned. "And I'm questioning your sanities."

"Check Aelita too. No way she wouldn't know about his little scheme." The boy added.

"No one is 'checking' me!" Aelita snapped.

"Everybody, settle down!" Mrs. Meyer intervened. "I expect you to respect each other but more importantly I still have most of your papers to get back. Besides, Jeremie still has one of the highest grade point averages in this school."

"C'mon Jeremie." Aelita said getting up. "We should meet up with the others. We've got our grades." Jeremie got to his feet as well and the two of them ducked out of the classroom to come face to face with Laura Gauthier, who stood cross-armed in front of them. She was refusing to take her eyes off of Jeremie. "Can we help you?" Aelita asked tilting her head.

"A 92." She said simply, still not taking her eyes off Jeremie. "When I transferred here, I was assured by many students, not the least of which your annoying friends Odd and Ulrich, that no matter how hard I tried my grades wouldn't match up to yours. All that boasting your friends did for you, and you come out with a B? Were you even trying?"

"What?" Jeremie asked slightly lost.

"Is that your game? You're trying to mock me by trying to beat me with a low score? ...No, you're too smart for that. So why is my only rival slipping before I get a chance to cream him?"

"Listen, I'm sorry if Odd and Ulrich rubbed you the wrong way. They can be a little...eccentric." Aelita said. "But honestly Jeremie doesn't really get grades under 98s." She explained. "This is a one-off incident. If it's competition you're worried about I assure you we both can-"

"I'm not interested in you, pinky." Laura interrupted. "Only him. I've seen your grades, Aelita Stones. You couldn't top me in your dreams. Beating you is meaningless."

"What?!" Aelita growled.

"But besting Belpois at a low point..." She said shaking her head. "That's also unacceptable. You need to be at your best when your reign crumbles."

"Reign?" Jeremie asked. He turned a questioning glance toward Aelita who just shrugged at him.

"Hold onto that crown while you can, because now that I'm here, they're not going to be calling you Einstein much longer. Soon you'll be just as average as everyone else." Laura boasted. She brushed her hair back behind her shoulders and strutted away.

As soon as she was out of earshot, Aelita turned her head to Jeremie. "I don't like her." She said. "She needs to learn a little respect."

"She definitely makes a bad first impression." Jeremie said nodding. "All most seems like she-"

"Hates you?" Aelita and Jeremie turned around to see William leaning up against the wall of the building behind them. "She might. I know all about her." William said coolly.

"Shouldn't you be in detention?" Jeremie asked. "Where's Jim?"

"No idea. He didn't come to escort me to detention this morning. The hell if I'm going there willingly." He scoffed. "Anyway, Laura...she's not going to leave you alone anytime soon."

"How do you know her?" Aelita asked. "This is the first time she's ever spoken to us."

"That school that I got kicked out of, right before I was transferred here; she was a student there too. The top student. A lot like if you had been born female and then tough how to act by honey badgers." He said referring to Jeremie.

"And her problem is?" Aelita asked folding her arms. "I've never met a student so...off-putting. Even Sissi doesn't give me the same vibe."

"Her problem is that she hops around from school to school besting the students with the best grades in one way or another and once she's exerted her superiority over everyone, she leaves to move on to the next school. She hates anyone who can best her in the world of academics. And Jeremie could definitely do that." William told them. "Her parents are just pathetic enough to feed into this weird hobby of hers. They must've finally made enough money to send her here."

"How do you know so much about her?" Jeremie asked.

"I... may have been a part of her posse of troublemakers for a while... until they kicked me out." William admitted.

"You were _friends_? With _her_?" Aelita asked.

"Not friends. Sure, we hung out all the time, and even helped each other out from time to time, but... we didn't like each other. It was all business. We only did it to maintain our status as the top of the food chain. Back then, I didn't really have any friends. So, I just figured it was better to sit at the top than in the slumps with everyone else." William recalled. "Anyway, Laura will do anything to get her way, and while I've never witnessed her cheat, I can't say she's above it."

"In a world with X.A.N.A.?" Jeremie said cocking his head. "How bad can she be?" He chuckled.

"Fair enough." William conceded. "C'mon the others wanna get to the cafeteria before all the good stuffs gone, and I'm depressing myself talking about Laura."

Before Jeremie could agree, Aelita cut in. "You go on ahead, William. There's something we need to take care of first. Couple's stuff. You probably don't want to be here for it. We won't be long." William just shrugged and walked off.

"When did she get so forward?" He muttered to himself.

As soon as William was out of earshot Aelita turned back to Jeremie and gave him a serious look. "So, are you gonna tell me?" She asked.

"Tell you what?" Jeremie asked. He thought for a second and then realized. "You mean the tests." He said.

"Yes. You don't get anything but A's. What's going on?" She asked.

"Is it that weird that I got a lower grade than usual?" He asked. "Maybe I'm just having a rough time. Is it really that big of a deal to you?" He asked worriedly.

"Jeremie, I'd love you if you were a flunky like Odd," She answered not tearing away her gaze from his eyes. "but you're not. You can try to fool me but you won't. You're still hung up on what happened before aren't you?"

Jeremie let out a sigh. "I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to fool you; I just didn't want you worrying." He answered.

"Too late." She rested a hand on his shoulder. "Why are you still so focused on that? I thought we agreed to disregard it until we knew it was one-hundred-percent true."

"How can I not be focused on it?" Jeremie shot back sadly. "I revived X.A.N.A. I endangered everyone. Including my best friends, my family. It makes too much sense not to be true. We even found the residue in me too. If that's not concrete, I don't know what is."

"Let's pretend for a minute that you're right and it was you." Aelita conceded. "X.A.N.A. was in control. You weren't yourself. He used you. No one else blames you, so you need to stop blaming yourself."

"I can't help it. If I had just been able to resist..." He stressed. "This could've all been avoided."

"Maybe." Aelita said softly. "But that still doesn't make any of this your fault. You don't blame me for what I've done under X.A.N.A.'s control, do you?" She asked honestly.

"Of course not." Jeremie shot back quickly. "But-"

"Uh-uh." She cut him off. She quickly grabbed his left hand in both of hers. "Don't even finish that thought. I want you to promise me you'll stop beating yourself up. We need a leader. And I need the real Jeremie." She pleaded.

"Okay." Jeremie smiled. "I promise I'll stop fixating. For you." She leaned forward and gave Jeremie a kiss on the lips.

"That's what I wanted to hear." She smiled leaning back onto her feet normally. "Now come on," She said pulling him forward. "Odd'll start making up stories about what we've been doing if we take any longer." She and Jeremie walked hand in hand back to their usual meeting spot, the vending machines right outside the cafeteria. They quickly met up with Yumi, William, Emillie, Sam, and Patrick.

"Where're Odd and Ulrich?" Jeremie asked. "Did they get held after?"

"Odd got tired of waiting for you." Yumi said. "Said he wasn't going to be cheated out of his shepherd's pie because of you. Ulrich went in after him."

"Why didn't you guys just go in with them?" Aelita asked sincerely. "It's not like we care if you start without us."

"Because some of us have enough manners to wait until everyone is served before eating." Emillie said. "But for some reason Odd doesn't."

"Well, Odd is Odd." Jeremie said. "It's just how he is, always thinking with his stomach." He chuckled. "No harm in that."

"We probably should warn you three as well," Yumi interrupted. "Ulrich's in a very sour mood." She said. "He got a 45 on his last test."

"Ouch." Aelita said. "He must've fallen behind because of X.A.N.A. He's really taking it that bad?"

"Oh, he couldn't care less about his grade. But Delmas, in his great wisdom, took the liberty to call Ulrich's dad." Yumi told them. "He'll be here this afternoon to talk with him. That's what got him pissed. So, do me a favor and go easy on the teasing today."

"Sure." Jeremie said. "Boy am I glad my parents never got called here." He spoke lightly. "That would be a nightmare."

As he and the rest of the warriors shuffled into the cafeteria, halfway across the campus, Principle Delmas was making what he perceived to be a very important call. As he dialed the number and brought the phone up to his ear, he let out a sigh. As soon as the call connected, he recomposed himself. "Hello. Yes, this is principle Delmas of Kadic, am I speaking to Mr. Belpois?"

'Yes.' A voice answered. 'This is Michael Belpois.'

"Good afternoon Mr. Belpois. I'm calling because something rather unprecedented happened today and I wanted to make sure everything was alright at your home."

'Why? What happened?'

"Well, as you know, your son is a star student, a model to follow for everyone. But in the three quizzes that came back today, he didn't get A's as usual, they all came back at 91 or 92. In all his time here at Kadic, that's never happened with him. In fact, before today, he's never gotten anything below 97."

'That is strange.' Jeremie's father replied. 'Jeremie's never gotten anything less than an A, so for him to get anything less is not a good thing. But that can't be it.'

"It's not. He's shown quite a rebellious side lately." Delmas said shaking his head. "Meeting with people after lights out, talking back, refusing to tell the truth, disappearing for hours at a time, playing on his laptop in class, it's just not like him. He's already shown unwillingness to talk to me, but he speaks so highly of you. Perhaps you'd be willing to come by this afternoon to have a chat with him."

'Yes. I have the afternoon off. What time do you want me there?'

"I have another father-son meeting going on at two today. A friend of Jeremie's, actually. Why don't you come by then so I don't have to clear two spots in my schedule?" Delmas offered. "I'm sure Mr. Stern won't mind."

'Sounds like a plan, I look forward to seeing you and my son. Hopefully we can get to the bottom of this.'

After Michael hung up the phone, Delmas placed his back onto its spot and moved over to his desk's built-in comm link. He pressed down on the red button and leaned forward. "Nicole, any word from Jim?" He asked.

'Yes.' His secretary answered. 'Unfortunately, he's cancelled all gym classes for the day. He's not feeling well. He hasn't left his room since last night. He's not letting anyone come in to examine him either. We're all rather worried.'

"If he wants to be left alone, we'll give him an hour to himself. After that, try again if you will. We can't let another sickness overtake the school. I want to be the first to hear of any updates on the situation." Mr. Delmas leaned back into his chair. 'In the twelve years I've known him and the ten he's worked here; he's never taken a sick day before. He's tough as a brick. Kidney stones, hernia, appendicitis, nothing fazes him.' Delmas thought to himself. 'What could possibly be so bad that he would cancel his classes?'

~Jim's Room~

~1:00 p.m.~

Jim rolled around in his bed holding his head in his hands and groaning loudly constantly. His head was going so fast he couldn't think. It took all his concentration just to call in to cancel his classes today. He was currently being plagued by visions of himself. The catch was that the things had never happened. Or at least not that he could remember. And he remembered everything even if he'd rather not talk about most of it. "Oh..." He groaned. Ever since that detention session with William. When his mind is clear, all he can focus on is that stupid drawing.

-24 hours ago-

William sat silently in the library leaning back in his chair and having his feet rest against the edge of the table. He rocked back and forth as he carefully dragged his pencil across his sketchbook in a perfect circle. With that he had finished it. A perfect recreation of X.A.N.A.'s sign. Why he drew it, he didn't know. He just always went with what was on his mind. He lightly shaded in the image he knew all too well.

"Dunbar!" Jim's voice roared. "Feet off the table! The is a library, not a lounge!" He scolded the young boy. William frowned, annoyed, and picked his feet up off the table and resting them below the desk where they belonged.

"Sorry, Jim." William said unattached. "Just trying to get comfortable. Won't happen again...probably." He smirked.

Jim got out from behind his desk and made his way over to William. "Shouldn't you be doing homework? You've been fiddling with that sketchbook for hours." In response William reached down into his bag and pulled out a blue folder. He then began to wave it in front of Jim.

"Homework's done." He said coolly. He flicked his wrist and tossed the folder carelessly onto the table. "Easy-peasy. You can look it over if you really want, but I'm not re-doing anything."

"I'll never understand why you just won't apply yourself, Dunbar! You'd get so much farther-"

"If I just put a little effort in?" He asked knowingly, "Effort's not really my thing. Not with schooling at least. And I like it that way." He continued shading with his pencil as Jim glared at him.

"Now listen here Dunbar," He growled slamming his palms against the table and leaning forward. "I know you didn't do the crime, but this is still detention! You're in a library! Why not read a book instead of drawing..." He leaned over and took a look at William's drawing. "...what is that? A bug?" He asked raising an eyebrow.

William's head shot up as he realized what he was doing. He slammed his sketchbook shut and threw it on the ground harshly. "Uhm...yeah it was a spider."

"But it only had four legs." Jim said. "And one eye."

"I'm sorry, I thought you were supposed to use your _imagination_ when creating art." William snarked crossing his arms.

Jim rolled over in his bed. Right now visions of himself sleeping on the hard floor alone in a giant factory were flashing in his mind. Everything he saw was overlaid by that picture William was drawing. More and more scenes flashed before his closed eyes. Until it stopped on a blur. He couldn't make anything out on this one. Suddenly he there was a knock at the door.

"Jim?" Nurse Yolanda's voice called. The door to his room slowly creaked open and Yolanda peeked her head in with her hand covering her eyes. "Jim, are you decent?" She slowly removed her hand and stepped in to the room. "Jean-Pierre asked me to check on you and give a diagnosis." She explained.

Though he could hear Nurse Yolanda, there's was too much going on inside his head to chat at the moment. He just kept groaning painfully. "Jim, can you hear me?" She asked approaching his bedside. When she got no answer from him, she rested her hand on his forehead. "No fever." She said shaking her head. "Dehydration?" She guessed. "Could be hallucinating." she thought out loud. "But then how did he call in for work? Come on, Jim. Work with me!"

The vision in Jim's head slowly became cleared he was huddled next to Jeremie who was playing around with some sort of...supercomputer. Suddenly he heard Jeremie's voice as he hit the enter key on the computer's keyboard.

'Code: Earth.' He said.

The vision shifted to an orange walled room where he was now joined with Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi on top of Jeremie. A tall tower in front of him opened slowly and revealed a body curled up into a ball... Aelita Stones.

'She's here at last.' He could hear Jeremie's voice again. 'Welcome to Earth.'

"Aelita..." Jim groaned. "Aelita...she..."

"Jim!" Yolanda cried. "What is it? What about Aelita?" Suddenly Jim lost consciousness and fell limp onto his bed. "Jim?!" She slowly stood back up and grabbed the walkie out of her pocket. "Jean-Pierre?" She called into the machine.

'Yes, Yolanda?' Principle Delmas replied. 'An update on Jim?'

"Oh, he's sick alright. I'm not even sure he knows I'm here. No fever. Pulse is fine. But something's wrong. I'll need help taking him back to the infirmary to do a few tests. A stretcher if you wouldn't mind."

'Of course. Were there any clues at all?'

"Nothing of significance." Yolanda reported. "A lot of groaning, but that could be anything. He was trying to say something about Aelita, but he lost consciousness before he could finish his thought... if he could. Maybe she knows what's wrong with him? Or it could just be utter nonsense as a result of whatever's ailing him."

'Understood. I'll be sure to question Aelita. Keep me updated.' Delmas said seriously.

Yolanda pocketed the walkie and pulled a blanket over Jim's body. "Don't worry, Jim. I'll do my best to find out exactly what's wrong with you."

~Kadic Cafeteria~

The group of nine warriors sat at the newly elongated tables eating their very mediocre lunches. Jeremie, Aelita, Patrick, Odd, and William on one side; Ulrich, Yumi, Sam, and Emillie on the other. "Come on, Ulrich." William prompted. "Think about it. This is one of the highest ranked schools in France! And the highest within a thousand-mile radius. Your dad would be a fool to think you could get any better an education somewhere else."

"But my dad is a fool." Ulrich growled at the older boy. "You don't know him. He never once asks what I want. The Sterns have always been doctors, lawyers, politicians, and that's how he wants to model me."

"Good luck with that. You're not brainy enough for any of those careers! Even I did better than you!" Odd laughed with a full mouth. He looked up at Ulrich just in time for a cup's worth of cottage cheese to collide with his face. Through the cheese covering his face he could see Ulrich giving him the evil eye. "I guess I deserved that." He squinted and then coughed up a bit of shepherd's pie mixed with cottage cheese onto his tray.

"Could you be any more gross?" Emillie glared scooting farther down the bench. "You're like a sick animal." She turned to Sam to see her eating just as fast as before. "How can you still be eating after that?"

Sam just shrugged her off. After she swallowed her food down, she met Emillie's gaze. "I've got eight brothers. Four younger than me and four older. I've been barraged with this kind of stuff my whole life." She pointed her fork at Emillie's tray. "You gonna finish that or keep complaining?" She asked. Emillie groaned and slid her tray over to Sam.

"You just need to give him a reason to believe Kadic is the best place for you to be." Aelita advised. "Maybe tell him just how many successful people with six-figure salaries graduated from here."

"We could try talking to him." Patrick suggested. "He's a father. He has to care at least a little bit about your happiness. Maybe if he sees us having fun together as friends, he'll be less likely to take you out of Kadic."

"Nah." Jeremie interrupted. "That won't work. I've met him a couple times and from what I can tell his dad is...well he just sucks. I don't think there's a paternal bone in that guy's body."

"Well," Odd interjected. "we could always tell him that you're a super powerful warrior and we need you here to save the world." Odd suggested. "Mommy always did say honesty is the best policy." He mocked. William reached behind him and smacked him upside the head knocking him off the bench and onto the floor.

"Eating on the floor like the dog you are, Odd?" A familiar voice asked. From the floor, Odd looked up to see Sissi gazing down at him. He slowly staggered to his feet grabbing hold of the table for balance.

"Better off a dog than an ogre like you, wouldn't you agree, my dear?" Odd smirked. He sat back down on his seat. "Whatever makeup you've got on today, it's not working for ya."

"Very funny." She said sarcastically. "Pig." She muttered.

"Did you come over here for a reason?" Yumi asked, clearly annoyed. "Or did you just want to insult Odd? I'd rather you just leave if you don't have a good reason to be here."

"Oh, calm down, I'm here to help, not steal your boyfriend. Unless, of course, you let your guard down." She winked.

"Sissi..." Ulrich said pinching his brow in frustration. "I'm not really in the mood for this today. Stop insulting my friends, or go away." He growled.

"Oh, but I thought _we_ were friends. And friends help each other. And I can help you with your little problem." She leaned forward over the table. "I can help you stay here."

"How'd you know about that?" Patrick asked.

"Oh, please. I hear everything daddy hears." She boasted.

"Why are you so helpful all of the sudden?" Emillie asked. "I thought you didn't like us."

"It's true I don't really care for most of you." She acknowledged. "Nerds and losers aren't really my thing. But especially hate long-distance relationships."

"Why do you care? You'd need to find someone because last time I checked Ulrich's dating Yumi, not you." Aelita prodded.

"And I can't win him over if he's not here!" She snapped slamming her fist into the table. "Now do you want my help or not?"

Ulrich shared a quick look with Jeremie and then another with Yumi. He let out a heavy sigh. "What do I have to lose?" He said defeated. "What do you got?"

"I was in the room, you know? When daddy called yours, I mean." She informed them. "You don't need to make your father like Kadic, from the phone call daddy had, it sounds like he's made up his mind. But if you make the other schools look worse in comparison..."

"He'll have no choice but to keep me here." Ulrich realized. "Sissi, that's it." He exclaimed. "But how? I don't know anything about the schools he's looking at."

"As the principle's daughter, I've got a lot of pull, you know?" She said pridefully. She reached into her bag and pulled out a yellow folder. "This is all the dirt you could hope for on every high ranked school in Bordeaux. And to further solidify the dirt on them. Meet my new friend Laura." From an adjacent table Laura heard her name and turned to Sissi. She motioned for the blonde to come stand next to her.

"Laura? You're friends with _her_?" Aelita asked as Laura joined Sissi in front of the table.

"Of course. We have so much in common, after all." Sissi said wrapping her arm around Laura who just smiled back at her. "We're both stunningly beautiful, we both love Spanish cuisine-"

"You're both frail little snowflakes with no fight in you?" Sam asked raising an eyebrow.

"Ooh! Ooh!" Odd interrupted raising his hand. "You both have terrible personalities?" Odd added excitedly.

"You both have egos the size of Russia?" Aelita asked disengaged. Not even caring enough to look away from her food tray.

"You do realize that I'm the only one in this school who can help you, right?" Laura asked seriously. "I've been to the majority of these schools. I know them inside-out. Wouldn't you agree, William?"

Up until this point William had been keeping quiet, praying that all the insults would keep Laura from recognizing him. Obviously, he was wrong. He looked dejectedly back at her. "Why are you asking me?" He asked.

"Because you know me better than anyone here." Laura prodded. "Don't play dumb after all we've been through."

"You know her?" Ulrich asked. "How?"

"Didn't William tell you? He got kicked out of our school because he went around posting love letters and posters declaring his love for me." She said cockily. "He had fallen pretty hard."

"This is the girl you told me about all those years ago?" Yumi asked incredulously. "This is the one you were in love with?"

"Not my brightest moments." William grumbled. "After she ratted me out and got me sent away, I realized how wrong I was. She might just be incapable of love." He said angrily. "I had hoped to never speak to you again."

Laura shook her head at him. "How rude." She said. "Maybe I shouldn't help you after all."

"Why _are_ you helping us?" Aelita finally asked. "From the way you spoke to us earlier; I would've thought you hated us."

"I'm helping because Sissi asked me to. That's what friends do. Right, William?"

William got up from his seat swiftly. "I'm out of here." He said in anger. "Odd can have the rest of my food." Odd quickly snatched his tray and pulled it over to himself. As he walked away the Lyoko warriors shared a glance.

"Maybe someone should go after him." Yumi said. "If he broods for too long, he won't be pleasant to deal with for days."

"On it!" Patrick said getting up. "All this tension's getting to me anyway. Call if you need anything!" He called behind him.

"So do we have a deal?" Laura asked.

"Deal?" Ulrich asked. "I thought you said you were just doing this because Sissi asked you to, and friendship, and something or other."

"All that's still true. But everything has a price." Laura informed him.

Ulrich looked at the folder on the table and then to his watch. 1:45. He had fifteen minutes. He slammed his head against the hard table. "Okay." He grumbled. "Deal."

"What do you want in return?" Yumi asked.

"Don't know. I'm sure something will come along. If not the feeling of having someone indebted to yourself is a great thing in itself. Goodbye, Ulrich. I'll be in touch." She walked away smirking to herself.

"Lovely friend you got there." Odd quipped. "She'd be kinda cute if she didn't talk like a comic book villain all the time."

"Shut up, Odd!" Sissi snapped. "You're just lucky you're Ulrich's best friend or I'd beat the snot out of you right here and now!" She threatened pointing a finger in his face.

"Perish the thought." He said stuffing his mouth with William's food. "Everyone knows how much you hate _actual work_."

"All right, break it up!" Everyone turned to see their school's psychologist, Hans Klotz, walking towards them. "Sissi, Odd, if you continue this little skirmish, I'll send you both to Principle Delmas."

"What are you doing here, Mr. Klotz?" Aelita asked. "I've never seen you in the student cafeteria before."

"Jim's very ill, unfortunately. So, being the one with the least to do, I was asked to assume his duties until further notice." Klotz informed them. "First of which is-"

"Jim's sick?" Yumi asked.

"Yes." Klotz answered annoyed. "Don't interrupt me. My first duty is to bring Stern and Belpois to Delmas's office." He said seriously. "Up and at 'em. Both of you."

"Me?" Jeremie asked. "What does Delmas want with me? I haven't done anything."

"Delmas called your father in." He said plainly. "As of two minutes ago, he had just pulled into the parking lot. Now come on, lunch is over."

Ulrich eyed Laura's folder for a moment before growling and snatching it, tucking it under his armpit. "Come on, Einstein." He said standing up. "Let's get this over with." Jeremie lowered his head and stood up as well.

~The Office~

Joseph Stern stood in the main office, alone with the receptionist, tapping his foot impatiently as he was told to wait for his son to be brought to him. He turned his head to Nicole and frowned. "How long does it take to bring one boy to the office?" He asked, clearly annoyed. Nicole just shrugged and continued with her work.

Suddenly the door to the main office flew open and although Mr. Stern was expecting his son and the psychologist, he was met with a man of similar height and build. The man ran a hand through his short brown hair and chuckled. "This place is a lot bigger than I remembered. I-" His eyes met Joseph's and he stopped mid-sentence. "Hey, your Ulrich's father." He said approaching the man. "It's nice to finally formally introduce myself. I'm Michael. My son speaks very highly of yours; you know?" He said offering a hand.

"The pleasure is all mine." The businessman said accepting the offer. "I wish our meeting could've been under better circumstances." As he shook his hand, he decided to pry further. "So, your son in trouble as well?"

"Apparently so. And I have no idea why." Michael frowned. "He's so bright and so well-behaved on a regular basis, I can't imagine what's going on. My wife nearly passed out when I told her Jeremie got a B."

"Mine's not doing well, either." Mr. Stern said angrily. "After all I've done to give him the best in life, he always throws it away. I've used my wealth to give him everything he needs to be a successful. It's so infuriating."

"I'm sorry to hear that. I can't imagine what that feels like." Michael responded carefully.

"What do you mean?" Mr. Stern prodded.

"Well I've never really had all that much money. In fact, it takes pretty much every last euro just to be able to pay for his schooling." Michael confessed. "Being a drop-out, all the big paying companies didn't really consider me."

"You're a high school drop-out?" Mr. Stern asked baffled. "Your son is the number one student in one of the top schools in the country. I would have thought you'd at least have some kind of associates degree." He quipped.

Michael laughed jovially. "You would think." He agreed. "But honestly, both me and his mother dropped out of high school our senior year." He admitted rather happily. "Neither of us have any idea where his brains came from."

"Interesting." Joseph said in thought.

"Dad." Mr. Stern turned around to see the school psychologist, his son, and Jeremie standing in the doorway. "I hope you've taken your meds, because this is going to be one unpleasant conversation." He growled.

"I can see that." Mr. Stern replied. "And I hope you've said goodbye to your group of friends because we'll be out of here within the hour."

"I'm not going anywhere." Ulrich spat back.

"Wow." Michael said quietly as Jeremie joined his side. "There's a lot of tension between those two." He said. "They talk like they hate each other."

"They've been that way ever since I've known Ulrich." Jeremie nodded. "And according to Ulrich, long before that too."

"Well. Now that you're all re-acquainted, why don't the four of you step into my office so you can have your chat." Principle Delmas said opening his door. "And Ulrich..." He said catching the boy by surprise. "do try to be civil about it." Ulrich scoffed and turned away.

As the four of them shuffled into the office they found two chairs set up on one side of the room and two more on the other side. Ulrich and Jeremie took their seats closest to Delmas's desk and their fathers took the other two. "I'll leave you to it then." Delmas said stepping outside of the room. "You've got an hour." He finished closing the door.

Mr. Stern wasted no time getting to the point. "Seems like not that long ago, the two of us were in a much similar situation, son. Now one of your troublemaker friends is with you as well." He said.

"Shows what you know. Jeremie happens to be a rule follower to the core." Ulrich shot back. "I'm the defiant one."

Before Mr. Belpois could say anything, Mr. Stern growled. "Why do you do this to me?" Mr. Stern said angrily. "I've given you everything you could ever need to succeed and you've spat in my face every time. You insist on going here, you refuse to dress for success, and you completely ignore potential friends that could help further your future career."

"Yeah, I do. Because you're so obsessed with getting me a high paying job to keep the family fortune going, that you forgot to be a parent. When was the last time you told me you were proud of me? Or even an I love you?" Ulrich retorted. "It's like you're trying to push your rich lifestyle on me twenty-four-seven."

"You're rich?!" Jeremie exclaimed turning to Ulrich.

"Filthy Stinkin'." Ulrich replied scornfully. He leaned back into his chair and crossed his arms.

"If I could get a word in-" Michael tried.

"My goal is to make you a functioning member of the top class. But your refuse me at every point. Any father who loves his son would be doing what I am!"

"You don't love _me_!" Ulrich accused pointing an accusatory finger at his father. "You _love_ what I can do for you! You just want to preserve your image as this immaculate person who can do no wrong and worked so hard to get where you are!"

"And I didn't work hard?!" His father shot back.

"Oh, you did. At the expense of being my father! Mom practically raised me on her own because you were so caught up in your business to take responsibility!" Ulrich spat venomously.

"I'm setting you up for success!"

"No, you were afraid that I would expose you for the selfish, shallow person you are, not the saint the business world of Bordeaux sees you as. So you're trying to turn me into you!" Ulrich sneered. "I don't want to be you! I want to stay here. With Yumi. And Jeremie. And all my other friends that you never gave a fair shake to." He ranted.

"You can make new friends." Joseph said. "You only have one father."

"What do you know? You don't make friends, you make connections!" Ulrich said standing up out of his chair. "Were you born this way?! Have you ever even had a friend?!"

"Look at the friends you've made. Not something to write home about, are they?" Mr. Stern said seriously.

"Hey!" Michael said finally getting into the conversation. "That's my only son you're talking about." He said in anger. In the background Jeremie got up and gently pulled Ulrich back down to his seat. "Anyone would be lucky to have him as a friend. And whether you like it or not Jeremie's taken quite a liking to Ulrich."

"What do you know, drop-out?" Joseph growled. Michael's eyes shot open in surprise at the insult. "Neither of this boy's parents even graduated high school. Why should their son be hanging around mine?"

"Because we're friends!" Ulrich and Jeremie said in unison.

"And because high school is hardly a judge on parenting." Mr. Belpois added. "Jeremie's a good kid with a good head on his shoulders."

"Sure, he is." Joseph replied sarcastically. "That's why he's here with my troublemaker of a son. If he's so smart and has such a good head, why are you here to scold him?" Mr. Belpois raised a finger in the air ready to retort.

"His parents may not have graduated," Ulrich interrupted. "but Jeremie's smarter than most of the teachers here. Even smarter than you."

"I doubt that, but even if it were true, can the same be said of your other friends? Odd's your typical flunky. He won't last much longer in an academic setting. I can't even find any files on your friend Aelita before she got here. Apparently, no one's ever had much good to say about her. And Yumi's never shown to be anything special. Just an ordinary girl." Mr. Stern complained.

"Jeremie, do me a solid and hold me back." Ulrich said dangerously not taking his eyes off his father.

"I'm not sure I want too." Jeremie seethed crossing his arms, seemingly just as angry as Ulrich. "'never had anything good to say', what do you know?" He grunted.

"Welcome to my world." Ulrich replied angrily. "Jackass."

"Excuse me?!" Mr. Stern's eyes shot open.

"I feel like things are getting a little too heated in here." Mr. Belpois said carefully. "Joseph, I believe you owe these boys an apology for your remarks about their friends. Then, maybe it'd be best if we took a five-minute break." He suggested.

"I don't think I've ever met a son who defies his father's wishes as much as you do, Ulrich." Mr. Stern said, ignoring Belpois. "I brought you into this world, the least you could do is show a little respect." He leaned forward. "Or I'll take you and leave right this second."

Ulrich sighed in defeat. He grabbed the folder off the ground. "Those schools aren't as great as you think they are." He tossed the folder across the room. It landed on the floor and the papers inside fluttered out.

Ulrich's father leaned down and grabbed a few of them and brought them up to his face. He scanned them carefully before placing them on his lap. "Where did you get your hands on these?"

"Not proud of it. But if it means staying here with my friends, I'll make a deal with anyone. Even Laura Gauthier." Ulrich spat.

"Laura Gauthier... you don't say." Joseph said rubbing his chin. "That's interesting."

"Oh... I don't like that look." Ulrich said. "What's going on in that crappy head of yours?" He accused. "Don't tell me you know her."

"I don't. I know her father." Joseph said. "And her father is hell-bent on a suitor. But he wants one from a rich family..."

"Don't even think about it!" Ulrich shouted. "I'm happy with Yumi!"

"No, no. I think this could work. Think of the opportunities. Two powerful, wealthy families combined into one." Joseph beamed. "Her father won't be able to turn it down."

"Wait." Jeremie said. "I thought she was broke. I was told her parents had just enough money to send her here." He said.

"You need better sources." Mr. Stern said flatly. "You know, if we go through with this and play our cards right, we might have a real shot at dominating the top one percent." He smiled.

"Is that really all you care about?" Jeremie cut in. "What about Ulrich's happiness?"

"None of this matters anyway, with my report cards, there's no way a rich family would be interested in me as an escort." Ulrich reminded him. He leaned back into the chair. "Guess I'll just have to stick with Yumi." His lips curled up into a smile.

"Money can make those bad grades go away in an instant." Joseph said standing up. He grabbed his phone out of his pocket and opened it up. "I was only taking you to a different school to punish you, but with this kind of opportunity showing itself here at Kadic, you can stay."

XXXXX

William and Patrick had circled and regrouped with the rest of the group, minus Ulrich and Jeremie, as they made their way around the main campus. Odd looked around suddenly. "Do you hear that?" He said turning around. There was a large rumbling sound coming from ahead of them. "Thunder?"

"Sky's clear." Sam reminded him. "But I hear it too."

Suddenly a blue Peugeot came flying through the school grounds. "Look Out!" Emillie rushed past the rest of the group and tackled Odd and Sam out of the way just as the speeding car flew by them before continuing to crash into the school building's wall behind them. In a loud bang the structure above the vehicle came crashing down on top of it.

As Aelita gasped in horror, Odd and Sam rushed forward to the car. "Someone must be pretty hammered in there. How'd they even get into campus?" He asked no one. He came to a stop at the driver's side and the two of them began looking for a victim.

"No driver." Sam reported opening the car door. "Or passengers."

"X.A.N.A." Aelita realized. "He must be taking advantage of the fact that Ulrich and Jeremie are locked up in the principal's office." She guessed.

"How much you wanna bet there'll be more cars on the way?" William asked looking around for anything useful. "We'll never be able to outrun them on foot." He noticed the schools bike rack to his left and a light bulb went off in his head. He grabbed a large rock off the ground and smashed it against one of the bike locks, snapping it in half as it fell to the ground. "You guys comin'?" He asked mounting the now free bike.

Yumi turned around at the sound of more rumbling. "That's sounds like more than one." She said. She mirrored William's past movements and crushed one of the locks to a bike. As she got on everyone else quickly caught on as well. "If we can make it to the woods, they won't be able to follow us." She said.

"I'll get Ulrich and Jeremie. The six of you should be able to hold off X.A.N.A. until we get back." William offered grabbing his phone. "Meet you back at the factory. Their probably sick of their parents by now anyway." Aelita nodded, and she, Yumi, and Patrick took off towards the woods.

"Hurry up, Odd!" Sam yelled pulling up next to him.

"I'm trying! My svelte arms aren't meant for breaking things!" He panicked desperately banging a rock against the chain. "My forte is laser arrows!"

Just as Odd finally freed a bike for himself the group were cut off. "What the hell happened out here?!" The three turned to see Mr. Klotz standing in enraged horror at the scene of an empty vehicle halfway through the school walls and three students stealing bikes.

"Gotta go!" Odd said waving. "The school won't save itself." He and Sam pedaled off after their friends before Klotz could say another word. As they pedaled off, an infuriated staff member turned to William and grabbed the boy on the shoulder.

"What in the world is going on here!" Klotz asked, face red with anger. "If you don't give me the best reason in the world for the state of this, I swear to god William."

William heard the sound of engines coming closer and growled to himself. He jumped off the bike and kicked it over in anger. "Forget it!" He said grabbing the psychologist's arm. "We gotta get inside!" As two more sports cars came into view, he dragged the adult into the school and slammed the double doors behind them.

"Dunbar! What is going on!"

William glared at the man for a moment, but before he could get a word out, one of the sports cars busted right through the wall of the school once again. The resulting force pushed William and Mr. Klotz into the wall behind them. "Damn it." William groaned as he slid back down to the floor.

Mr. Klotz eyed the totaled car in front of them cover by many bricks and other forms of debris. "I have no clue what's going on, but at least the car can't go anywhere now." He said. "Now what did Odd mean by-"

"It's not over yet." William said getting to his feet. In front of him the green and black car began to glow bright yellow. Slowly the popped tires reverted back to their original capacity. The dents against the door began to unfold back into the original mold and the shattered glass began reforming its lost pieces.

"Now what?"

"It's repairing itself!" William snapped. "Because of course it can! You gotta get as many people to the lower levels of the school as you can! There's no telling how many of these things are running around the campus. The safest place is somewhere where falling debris can't get to you."

"Well there is the old science lab that's right under the current one. It's probably the safest-"

"Then go!" William yelled.

"What about you?"

"I gotta find Jeremie and Ulrich." He said rushing off. He opened his phone up and dialed Jeremie's number before hitting the green button and the speakerphone button simultaneously. "Come on..." He prayed.

~Delmas's Office~

"You can't do this to Yumi! It'll break her heart to know she couldn't be with Ulrich." Jeremie pointed out. "...Or she could throw one hell of a tantrum." He muttered.

"Not my problem." He said emotionless, pocketing his phone. "The text has already been sent. As of now, I would say you have around twenty-four hours to tell your girlfriend it's over before she finds out the bad way." Joseph advised.

"Joseph, are you sure this is the path you want to take?" Mr. Belpois asked carefully. "Your son is obviously very smitten with this girl. Maybe arranged marriage isn't the way to go."

"He'll learn to love her. Just as I did when I was contracted." Mr. Stern said. "His mother and I had many happy years together before..." He trailed off. A single tear fell from his eye, before he squeezed them shut in retaliation. He opened them up, eyes dry once again. "Where was I?"

"You think you shed a single tear and then suddenly I'll overlook everything?" Ulrich raged. "I've already cried until my eyes couldn't produce anymore tears, but you can't care enough to show the same amount of attachment?!"

"Don't you dare-"

Mr. Stern was cut off by Jeremie's cell phone going off in his pocket. Jeremie quickly retrieved it and looked at the caller I.D. It read William. "Son?" His father asked as the phone continued to ring. "Is it urgent?"

"Yes." Jeremie said making his way to the door. "Please excuse me. I'll be right back. Ulrich try not to kill him while I'm gone." He opened the door and stepped outside the office, closing the door behind him. He brought the phone up to his ear. "William?" He asked.

'Finally.' William's voice responded. 'Where are you?'

"In the principal's office." He deadpanned. "You know, where you knew I'd be?" He asked.

'That's before the school turned into Los Santos!' William quipped. 'X.A.N.A.'s on the move. Vehicles crashing through school walls. The others have hopefully made it to the forest by now, but it's only a matter of time before we're surrounded!'

"Surrounded?" Jeremie questioned. "By cars?" He asked. Behind him a small little cloud of staticky smoke snuck its way under the door to the principal's office. "Where are you right now?"

'Outside the science lab. I can be there in a couple minutes. I'm running as fast as I can!'

"Okay. There's a backdoor in the gym that should spit us out right at the mouth of the timber." Jeremie replied. "I'll see if I can get Ulrich away from his dad long enough to-" He was interrupted by a loud crashing noise coming from the room behind him. "Ulrich..." He growled.

'Everything okay?'

"I think Ulrich just made a big mistake." Jeremie replied. "Meet us here and we can head off to the gym afterwards. The others can hold off X.A.N.A. until then." He hung up before William got a chance to reply. Jeremie burst through the door to the office and was met with Ulrich on the opposite side of Delmas's desk...which had been split in half. Clean through the center. "Ul-"

"Look out!" Ulrich yelled as his father swung his fist at his son. Ulrich easily blocked it but Mr. Stern reached out his hand and shot electricity through his palm and into his son's person. Jeremie rushed forward as Ulrich was engulfed in painful static but was held back by a super-human grip.

The lightning slowly died down. "Dad?" He said after turning around. His father's X.A.N.A. filled eyes gazed back at him menacingly. As he began tightening his grip around Jeremie's shoulder, causing the younger boy to let out a yelp of pain. "It hurts..." He growled.

Ulrich grabbed his father by the arm and spun around, tossing him across the room and into Michael, knocking them back into the wall. Ulrich maneuvered past the desk's debris, and made his way to the door. "Come on, Einstein." He said grabbing Jeremie's arm. He pulled him along with him out of the room. "As much as I'd love to stay here and kick my old man's butt, we gotta go."

The two made it about five feet before two stray beams of electricity blasted through the wall separating the office and the waiting room. Nicole let out a scream of terror and ducked under her desk as a large chunk of the wall crumbled to pieces and the two X.A.N.A.-fied fathers stepped through.

"Faster!" Ulrich said pushing Jeremie out the door. He slammed the door behind him (an action he soon realized was pointless). They both found William panting in front of them.

"I got here as fast as I could." William let out between breaths. "The others took some bikes into the forest..." He let out a big breath. "they should be at the factory by now."

"Great." Ulrich responded. "Just one problem."

"What?" Suddenly the wall behind Jeremie and Ulrich crumbled into pieces as two figures burst through the rubble. Michael charged side first right into his son knocking him down the hallway. Simultaneously, Ulrich's dad uppercut him from behind sending him to the ground right next to Jeremie. "Oh. That." The two possessed fathers then fired off two shots of lightning at William causing him to fall right between the other two boys.

"We have to get out of here." Jeremie groaned. He let out a cry of surprise as his father grabbed him by the ankle and dragged him off the floor. Meanwhile Ulrich's dad had done similarly and was holding his son up in the air by his hair.

On the floor, William stirred before getting up. He slowly opened his eyes to the scene taking place in front of him. "Guys!"

"Get Jeremie!" Ulrich growled. William nodded and charged forward crashing his side into Jeremie's dad. Michael flinched slightly and dropped Jeremie onto the floor. The X.A.N.A.-fied father turned his attention to William and outstretched his hands. William looked around and grabbed a piece of debris from the ground.

"No!" Jeremie called as he tackled William to the ground just as a shot of lightning went past where he stood. The two rolled over and got back to his feet.

"What the hell, man? I could've blocked that!" He said raising the short pole back up.

Jeremie quickly knocked it out of his hands. "Are you kidding me?! You'll kill yourself!" He shouted. As more electricity shot past them William quickly pushed Jeremie out of the way.

"Get back to the factory, Jeremie!" William yelled. "The others need you more than we do!" Jeremie stumbled towards the gym trying to regain his balance. He took one more look back at the losing battle his friends were fighting before rushing away.

"Go with him!" Ulrich growled. He quickly kicked his father in the chin, causing the elder to loosen his grip. From the floor Ulrich pushed himself up. "I'll handle these two by myself." He panted.

"Yeah." William said grabbing his arm. "And _I'm_ going to get _myself_ killed?" He scoffed. "Doesn't matter how strong you are, you can't take both of them."

Ulrich rushed forward and uppercut his father sending him sliding back. "Not... your... problem..." He said between breaths glaring at the older boy.

"It is now."

~Lyoko : Forest Sector~

Deep in the forest of Lyoko Aelita knelt down and gently touched her hand to the ground. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"Well, Aelita?" Odd asked impatiently. Both of their forms hadn't changed much if at all since the last time they were on Lyoko. Aelita still dressed in a pink bodysuit and Odd was still donning a purple catsuit. The only difference between either costume was that Aelita's wings seemed to be permanent. "Where is it?"

"I can't hear anything if you don't be quiet." She said, irritated. She paused for another moment before standing back up. "There's definitely a tower activated somewhere here in the forest, but I'm getting major vibrations from the ice sector, too. There's one there, too."

"Two towers at once?" Patrick asked. "Can X.A.N.A. do that?"

"With a functioning capacity over one hundred percent?" Aelita shot back. "Who knows what he really can do?"

"So, if there are two towers, how do we know which one to deactivate first?" Emillie asked. "What if ones doing more damage than the other?"

"No telling." Aelita answered standing back up. "We're already here in the forest so we deactivate the forest's tower first. That way." She said outstretching her arm behind her. "One tower and five monsters that-a-way." She clarified.

"Can you tell which monsters?" Sam asked. "It'd be nice to know what we're up against before we get there." She asked as the group began running in the direction Aelita pointed out.

"Normally, the bigger the monster, the bigger the quakes. Two small ones. Probably Tarantulas, two big ones, most like those armored spider-drone things, and one... Schiphizoa?... No, that's not it... I don't know what it is. It's not a monster I've sensed before."

"Well great," Yumi groaned moving up next to Aelita. "Not only do we have these new drones to worry about, but X.A.N.A.'s added yet another clown to the circus." She said. "I hope Ulrich's having a better time then we're about to."

"Hey, his dad may be unpleasant, but he's no X.A.N.A." Odd chimed. "Ulrich got off easy. The jack wagon should be here pulling his weight!"

The group of six slowly approached the activated tower to find... no monsters. "I know you lived here for like... a decade or whatever, but are you sure you sensed monsters." Emillie asked. "Because all I see is a tower."

"Never doubt the master, grasshopper, for you are still in the learning process, and we are experts." Odd chastised in his best Shaolin impression. Emillie quickly shot him a glare.

Aelita closed her eyes once more. "There here, all right. Two in front of us and two-" She was interrupted as Emillie let out a shriek of pain falling forward onto the ground in front of the group. A split second later Odd also let out a grunt and followed her down to the virtual floor. Aelita and Sam turned around to see to Tarantulas wobbling towards them. "-behind us." She said in a defeated voice.

"I found the others!" Yumi yelled pointing toward the tower. Slowly two Drones crept out from behind the activated tower, one on both sides. She looked behind her. "Sam switch places with me!" The two girls did simultaneous backflips into each other's places.

"I think I see where you're going with this!" Sam nodded. "Safeguard!" She yelled putting her hands out in front of her. From her armored body, a blue shield of light moved forward. As the two drones began firing odd lasers, Sam's shield kept expanding until it safely covered both Odd and Emillie's bodies.

"Nice name." Odd said slowly getting up.

"Thanks." She smiled. "Just made it up now. You good Emillie?" She turned to see Patrick helping Emillie back to her feet as well.

"Oh, yeah." She confirmed rubbing her arm. "You can let the shield down whenever you're ready."

"Good work rookie." Yumi complimented. She couldn't give her a proper compliment, complete with eye contact and smiles because she was currently fending off the lasers from two Tarantulas on her own with just her hand fans, but it was a compliment nonetheless. "Sorry to leave you with the big ones," She grunted deflecting another laser away from the group, "but I can't deflect lasers that big."

"We're surrounded." Patrick cut in. "You three are the experts. How do you want to handle this?"

"Those Drones are a much bigger threat!" Yumi said knocking another laser away. "They're much more powerful than the Tarantulas."

"Yeah!" Odd said. He cocked his arm and started firing his laser arrows off at the Drones. "And we can't get to the insignias from here. My arrows are hardly scratching them!"

"So, leave the Tarantulas to me!" Yumi ordered. "I can take them easy. You rookies go with Odd and take on those drones up close. Aelita can make her way to the tower during all the chaos. Cool with everyone?"

"Yeah, except the math here isn't adding up." Emillie said materializing her lasso into her hand. "Aelita said five enemies. We're missing one."

"I can't keep this shield up forever!" Sam called back to them. "I'm losing stamina fast!"

"We'll worry about it later!" Aelita said. "Sam let down the shield. Everyone, you heard Yumi, let's do this." Her wings flapped once behind and she shot into the sky. As she flew in between lasers, Odd took his opening.

"Sam, you got enough stamina for a smaller shield?" He asked excitedly. "I have a plan." Sam stood still and used her mind to generate a much smaller shield that descended in front of Odd. He Smiled at her before he began running up to them on all fours, using the shield as cover he didn't even have to change course once. As soon as he reached his target, he jumped up onto the top of the monster. "Prepare to die, sucker!" He stood up tall and pointed both arms down at the Drones armor. He began shooting at the armor chipping it away piece by piece. He soon uncovered a dormant man inside the glass tube. "Hello, there."

"Odd look out!" Sam called. Odd reacted to late, a bright blue laser, wider than anything the Tarantulas could create, knocked Odd clear off the creature and onto the grass below. He let out a grunt as he tumbled back further.

"Oh, that hurts." Odd groaned holding his head. He looked up to see both Drones focusing on him. "You guys are supposed to be helping!" He called to the other duo.

"I'm trying!" Emillie growled. She had her lasso wrapped tightly around one of the Drone's spindly legs, but it was easily pulling her along. "This thing's more stubborn than you are!" Suddenly she saw another hand grab onto her lasso. She turned to her side quickly. "Yumi? But the-"

"Dead and gone." Yumi cut her off. "On three we pull together." She said. "Once it's down we can attack it from there. And then we help Odd and Sam." Emillie nodded back at her and she smirked. "One...two...three!" They both pulled with everything they had and slowly the Drone began to wobble. Yumi backed away from Emillie and her lasso. "Should be offset enough now." She touched both hands to her temple and her eyes were engulfed in a pink glow.

"What are you-?"

"Telekinesis. My power here." She outstretched her arm slowly and then slammed it down through the air. Simultaneously the creature fell to the ground on its side. "Now attack it! Hit it hard!" She called.

" _Hard_? All I have is a lasso." Emillie complained. "I can't do full frontal assaults with this! Maybe I should let Patrick handle this." As soon as she closed her mouth Patrick flew through the air beside her and slammed his back against the activated tower before slumping to the ground. He just laid there as he started to fade away starting with his hand. In just a moment his avatar was no more. "Or not." She amended.

"Do these look like weapons to you?" Yumi asked pulling out her hand fans. "Nope. But I've killed countless monsters with them." She said. "You're smart. Improvise." She flipped over top the Drone and began slicing away at the wounded creature's armor.

Emillie took a moment to check her surroundings and noticed a rather thick, sharp branch hanging down from one of the virtual trees. She smirked to herself and whipped her lasso at the branch in question. She pulled her arms back cleanly tearing the branch of its resting place. "Yumi! Face it this way!"

"On it!" She slowly back away and held both hands out in front of her. "Odd! Sam! Cover me!" Sam nodded and put another barrier between her and the other Drone. The Drone Yumi was fighting slowly ascended into the air as a pink aura surrounded it. With a wave a Yumi's hand the Drone began to turn towards Emillie. "Whatever you're planning, do it quick! This thing's heavier than anything I've ever lifted before!"

Emillie tapped her chin in thought. "If I throw this branch at a speed of over fifty miles per hours at an angle of thirty degrees and the altitude of-"

"Cut the math and do it!" Yumi ordered. "Now!"

"Got it!" Emillie replied. She did a couple twirls on one heel before stomping her foot down and dematerializing her lasso at just the right time she'd calculated. The sharpened tree branch flew directly into the logo on the glass and easily penetrated the glass. There was a second of pause before the Drone, and the person inside, imploded on itself midair, fading away as it hit the floor.

"Never seen an enemy implode before." Yumi commented. "That's pretty dope." Meanwhile Odd and retaken his spot atop the other Drone and, with multiple laser arrows, delivered the final blow for the creature. He hopped of just as the second Drone collapsed in on itself, too.

"Yeah, the dopest." Sam deadpanned. "But how in the world did Emillie get a piece of wood to break through that thick glass so easily?"

"I thought I was screwed, too. But then I realized, it's not real wood." Emillie said. "Everything in Lyoko is made of the same stuff, it's all just data. Which means everything has the same mass. Even us."

Inside the tower Aelita gracefully landed onto the highest platform.

~Factory: Computer room~

The elevator doors opened slowly, and Jeremie bolted through, tripping slightly before stumbling to his chair. He jumped back into his chair and donned his headset.

"Hey cuz." Patrick's voice sounded.

Jeremie jumped in fright before regaining his composure. "Pat. What's going on? Have I missed it all?"

"Don't know." Patrick replied honestly. "I might not be as good at this Lyoko thing as I thought. But no one else has come back up, so that's good right?"

"Really good...or really bad." Jeremie replied. "Aelita? Can you hear me? Odd? Yumi?"

'We're here Einstein. Aelita's already inside the first tower.' Yumi's voice responded through the headphones. 'But Aelita says there's one in the Ice Sector, too.'

"I was afraid of that. I couldn't think of any link between our X.A.N.A.-fied parents and the possessed cars. Ulrich and William are fighting off my dad and Ulrich's as we speak."

"Ha!" Patrick let out. "Uncle Mike's not a fighter! They'll have him down and out in seconds."

"Under X.A.N.A.'s control, anyone can be a threat. Even my dad." Jeremie explained. He turned back to the screen. "Hey what's this? Odd, monster on your six!"

'There's nothing there.' Odd's voice called back.

"It's right here on the screen. It's right on top of you!" Jeremie snapped. "Yumi! Help him!"

'Sorry, Einstein. Odd's right. We're the only ones here.' Yumi replied.

"But..." He scanned the screen again. "Where'd it go? Is the stress finally getting to me?"

~Kadic Academy~

William and Ulrich were sprinting down the hallways followed closely by their electrified elders. William grabbed the top of one of the lockers and threw it to the floor in front of the two fathers. Ulrich's dad stepped right on top of it, flattening it with no effort at all. "So much for that. Hey, why aren't they shooting at us anymore?"

Suddenly a green minivan burst through the school walls in front of them. Ulrich grabbed William's arm and dragged him down another corridor. Another car smashed its way to the two boys, turning the wall into nothing but rubble. William turned around to see both fathers walking towards them. "Oh...they were trapping us." He realized. "Smart."

"Do you wanna give X.A.N.A. a medal or do you want to run?" Ulrich hissed. He climbed over the car in front of them and dropped back to the school floor. "Come on!" William vaulted over the car's hood, and followed Ulrich closely behind.

"We can't just keep running." William said. "We have to fight back!" He said. "Who knows how long until the others can deactivate the tower."

"We tried fighting already. We're outmatched!" Ulrich shot back. "Maybe we could take one of them, but both of them while cars could tear down our surroundings at any moment? We don't stand a chance."

"We just need a plan!" William tried. Suddenly the car they had just jumped exploded into a thousand pieces, large and small, all scattering across the floor. The two fathers walked through the resulting fire and raised their hands up against the two boys. Suddenly, a pipe from one of the damaged structures fell down in front of them. "Wait a minute. Jeremie said I'd kill myself fighting with these... What are these structures made of?" He said picking it up.

"I don't know. Probably heavy steel and large amounts of alu...mi...num..." His eyes widened in realization as he trailed off. He turned his head towards the pipe in William's hands. "It's a lightning rod!"

"I say we give them a taste of their own medicine." William smirked. "But we'll need to be in perfect sync. Think you can handle it?"

"I can handle ten times whatever you can." Ulrich said cockily. He looked to the crumbling column next to him and gave it his best kick. He stepped back just in time to miss the falling pile of rubble. From it he grabbed his own pipe and turned to meet William's eyes. "Ready."

"Meet back here?" William asked. Ulrich gave him a quick nod.

Ulrich spun the pipe around in his hand. He thoughtlessly charged toward his father holding the bar to his side. Joseph started shooting more lightning at the young boy but he easily rolled past it all. He quickly swung at his father separating the two fathers while William took on Jeremie's dad.

Ulrich raised the pipe above his head and brought it back down as hard as he could. His possessed father easily caught it with a single hand. Ulrich tried pulling the weapon back to his possession but his father's vice grip wouldn't let up. His father pushed back as the two fought for control, all four of their hands refusing to let go.

Ulrich was eventually pushed back to his starting point and he bumped into William who was right behind him dodging Mr. Belpois's strikes. Simultaneously Joseph and Michael raised their free hands toward the two boys. Ulrich shot William a glance out of the corner of his eye to find William looking back at him.

"Now!" William called. As the two fathers' bodies began coursing with electricity, Ulrich let go of the pipe and ducked down, before rolling through his father's legs. William smirked and echoed him just as two separate shots of lightning singed the tip of his hair. Before the adults could react, there were both stuck with each other's blasts, amplified by the metal pipes in their grasps. Ulrich and William both looked back just in time to see the shocks die down and the two elders fall over limply.

Ulrich slowly approached his unmoving father, ready to fight back at any moment. William cautiously moved forward as well. "Good work. That deserves a fist bump." William smirked. He offered up his balled hand to the younger boy.

"Agreed." Ulrich said bumping his fist with William's. "But you know I still don't like you, right?"

William quickly took his fist back and scowled at the younger boy. "No wonder Yumi chose you, you're such a charmer." He said sarcastically. He stalked away from Ulrich and up to Jeremie's unconscious father.

"Easy, man." Ulrich said as he followed close behind. "I'm just joking around with you. We just fought side by side for our lives. We can't get much closer than that."

William sighed. "I know, it's just... hey, shouldn't they be up again by now?" He knelt down next to Michael and snapped his fingers.

"Yeah, I guess. X.A.N.A.'s puppets do usually have more stamina in them." He said. He grabbed his father's eyelids and tore them apart. "Hey... my dad's not X.A.N.A.-fied anymore." He said examining his face. "The sign's left his eye!"

"Same here." William reported as he gently closed Michael's eye. "Aelita must've deactivated the tower. But they're not getting up."

"Well mine's breathing." Ulrich said. "We'll just have to wait for the return trip to-" He was cut off by the school around them shaking. "What was that?"

"Looks like those vehicles haven't slowed down." William said. "We have to get out of here. I told the school counselor to take as many people as he could find to the lower levels. We have to meet up with them. It's the safest place right now. At least until a rescue team comes."

"But if Aelita deactivated the tower, how could the vehicles still be possessed?" Ulrich asked. "It doesn't make sense."

"We can't stay here and theorize." William interjected. He grabbed Mr. Belpois's arm and wrapped it around his shoulder. "Grab your dad and let's go. We'll use the faculty elevator." William slowly made his way down the hall dragging Mr. Belpois with him.

Ulrich looked back at his father lying unconscious on the floor. He had to keep moving. The campus was still crawling with X.A.N.A.-fied automobiles. His father would only slow him down. He turned back to see William who was far ahead by now then back to his father.

~Lyoko : Forest Sector~

Aelita stumbled out of the tower and into the welcomed company of Odd, Yumi, Sam, and Emillie. 'Good job, Aelita.' Jeremie's voice called. 'But there's still a signal coming from the Ice Sector.'

"As good as it is to hear your voice, Jeremie, I have to point out that the Ice Sector is too far away. We might not make it in time. Who knows what havoc X.A.N.A. is wreaking right now?" Aelita said.

'Not to worry. I've got it covered. I studied Franz's SCIPIO program very closely and made my very own spin off: Code: MARCUS. It's the same principal, but this transport should transfer you straight to the Ice Sector's activated tower.'

"Where do you even find time to do all of this?" Sam asked.

'All I really had to do was copy the SCIPIO coding and make some modifications to it. Simple.' His voice answered. 'One Code: MARCUS coming right up.' A bright blue ball blinked into existence in front of the remaining warriors and with a sideways floating motion, absorbed all five of them. Everything went black for the five teens, until in a flash of light they found themselves in front of the second activated tower.

"Nice work, Einstein." Odd complimented. "This one's even unguarded."

"No, it's not." Aelita said instantly. She looked all around at the deserted wasteland surrounding her. "It's here. That fifth monster. The one I'd never felt before."

Everybody did a three-hundred-sixty-degree check of their surroundings. "There's nothing here." Sam surmised.

'Aelita's definitely right. I've got seven energy signals on the radar. The five of you, the tower, and something else.' Jeremie said into the mic. 'But you can't just stand there, you have to make your way to the tower.'

"On it! Stay in formation. I don't want it sneaking up on us." Aelita ordered. The five took their places. Aelita in the center and the four guardians each taking a place around her forming a ring around her. "We move together. As long as we keep an eye in every direction, we'll be ready. On three."

As soon as Aelita said three the group began making their way to the tower, albeit a lot slower than usual. Aelita was carefully checking her surroundings as she strolled forward. In front of her Odd walked, arm aimed ahead, ready for anything that might come into his field of view. To her left was Yumi and her right was Emillie both focused on the east and west, and Sam walked backwards slowly watching their sixes.

'This is weird. I finally got a lock on it, again. It's right in front of you.' Jeremie's voice called.

"Not this again! I'm telling you Einstein there's nothing here!" Odd snapped. "If it were in front of us, it would've attacked already. Maybe it's a trick to put us on edge."

"To what end?" Emillie asked. "If it were to unnerve us, there aren't any monsters to finish us off."

'Now it's on top of you. I'm running a scan as we speak, but it'll take a few moments.' Jeremie reported. 'Anything in the skies?'

"Negative, Jeremie." Aelita answered. "Just a barren wasteland. But we're almost there."

"Wait!" Sam shouted. "Something's got my foot!" She yelled. The group turned stopped abruptly and turned around to see Sam wrestling with a grey hand that was wrapped around her ankle. "Kill it!" She ordered, trying to pull her foot away. Suddenly her entire virtual body was engulfed in electricity originating from the foreign hand, and her avatar exploded into a million pixels.

"Ooh." Emillie cringed. "That does not look like a fun way to go. What is that?"

"It's a hand." Odd said. "Somebody didn't pay attention in anatomy." He said in a sing-song voice while bobbing his head back and forth with each word.

"Can you be serious for one minute!?" Emillie snapped.

The grey hand planted its palm onto the icy ground, cracking the ice underneath. Slowly another hand raised up out of the ground and slammed down on the ice as well. Odd rolled forward and pointed his arrow at the emerging monster.

"Everyone get back!" Yumi yelled. "That thing just one-shot Sam! We don't know what we're dealing with here!" As everyone but Odd back away slowly the two grounded hands slowly propelled the rest of the monster to the surface. First came a grey head of hair, and two white wings that just penetrated the surface.

"Doesn't matter what it is, all that matters is that I'm going to kill..." Suddenly he found two blood red eyes looking back at him. He backed away slowly as he got a closer look at the creature. "...her?" As a torso and legs quickly followed out of the ground the group finally got a full view of the lurker. Ghost-white skin and glowing red eyes. A full head of light grey shot hair, and dark grey face paint on her cheeks and point ears. And her suit... was a black and grey duplicate of Aelita's battle suit, the only other difference being the giant X.A.N.A. symbol on the midsection portion of the suit.

"It's like looking your looking at a black and white photo of yourself." Yumi commented looking to Aelita. "She looks exactly like you."

Odd let out a raspberry. "X.A.N.A.?" he scoffed. "More like _Xerox_." He smiled to himself proudly. He turned his head back to his peers. "Get it?" He prodded. "Cause she's-" Before he could finish, a black ball of energy hit his stomach and sent him flying back into Yumi. He crashed on top of her, his limbs falling limply to the side.

"Somehow, I agree with X.A.N.A. on that one." Emillie quipped.

"You're supposed to be _good_ at this, Odd." Yumi snapped from beneath him. She quickly shoved the boy off of her. She got up and looked down at the ground waiting for him to get back up, too.

"I am." He said still smiling. Before he knew it, his feet started dissolving away. "But when inspiration hits..." His mouth faded before he could finish his sentence.

"Jeremie, what is that thing?" Aelita asked.

'In a word...' Jeremie said examining the readout he got from the scan done on the monster. '...you.'

"That's not me Jeremie." Aelita growled. " _I'm_ me. What is that?"

"No time for interrogation." Yumi said stepping in front of Aelita. "You need to get to the tower and stop whatever's going on in the real world." She said. "Emillie and I will handle this." Aelita nodded and ran off in the opposite direction.

Emillie grunted and spun her rope up in the air. It shot forward roping up the copy with her lasso. "Restrained." She said. She grabbed her lasso with her other hand as well. "Might want to attack it now." With a flex of her wings Emillie's lasso was cut through like a kitchen knife through warm butter. The copy blasted into the sky, then jetted towards Aelita. Emillie tossed her cut up lasso to the side, before materializing a new one. "Those are some sharp wings." She observed.

"It's heading for Aelita!" Yumi called behind her. "Need I remind you, if we let her get de-virtualized, you can forget about saving the world within the next twenty-four hours."

The other Aelita descended down into the real Aelita, using as much weight as possible. Aelita face-planted into the ground. The copy quickly grabbed one of her wings and dragged her along the icy ground before tossing her aside. Before Aelita could get back up she grabbed her skin tight battle suit, crumpling it up in her hand and raised her up into the air. An energy ball formed in her hand, ready to end the fight. Suddenly it felt Emillie's lasso wrap around its ankle. Emillie pulled back tearing the creature away from Aelita.

"Hey Gloomy!" Yumi called. The dark replica turned to see two super sharp fans flying towards her. With a flick of her wrist she discarded Aelita as if she were a used tissue, and raised up the hand that had the energy ball formed in it and used it to knock both fans to the ground. She continued to fire her pre-formed energy ball at the rope pulling at her ankle, severing it just inches from her ankle. She looked back up at Yumi and Emillie, no positive emotion on her face.

"All will fall to X.A.N.A." The monochrome creature droned in monotone. It raised bot arms into the air and clapped them together. Slowly, a mass of black energy began gathering around its hands.

"It can talk?" Emillie asked taking a few steps back. "Since when can monsters talk?"

"I'm more worried about what it's cooking up." Yumi said. She looked to see Aelita still limp on the ground. "Aelita's still virtualized, so we just need to keep its attention on us until she gets back up." Yumi whispered to Emillie.

"Maybe if I can break her concentration again..." She launched her lasso back at the new monster who just stayed there and let it wrap around its torso. The replica calmly closed its red eyes and lowered its arms. Leaving the giant ball of energy suspended above its head.

"What's it doing now?" Emillie questioned. "It just let me rope it up."

"Don't know." Yumi said. "But we'd better get it further away from Aelita." She placed a hand on her temple and focused solely on the creature. Simultaneously, the two girls both began to pull the creature toward them. A small crack quickly formed under Yumi's shoe. Hearing the ice breaking, she looked down to examine it. The on crack turned into two, the three, in just moment the entire ground beneath them was shaking.

"Yumi?" Emillie questioned.

"Ignore it!" Yumi said. "Just keep pulling!" in front of her feet two icicles popped out of the ground raising up higher and higher with each second. She looked behind her to see more structures growing from the ground there too. Emillie scooched over closer to her.

"I think I know what it's doing now." Emillie said. The growing ice sliced through her lasso once again. She growled in frustration. "What is it with this thing today?!" She tossed the broken weapon to the side. "We have to get out of here!"

"I can't move or my hold over it will be lost." Yumi growled. "We can't let that energy ball hit Aelita."

Four giant icebergs now surrounded the two girls and more ice was quickly filling in the free space in-between each iceberg, all forming into on giant ice wall that closed the girls into a space of a five-foot radius. "I don't think that energy ball was ever meant for Aelita." Yumi looked up to see the amassed attack hovering above their little ceiling-less cage.

"Great." Yumi groaned. "Sorry Aelita." She slumped her shoulders briefly and her hold over the enemy was lifted. She looked up and focused her attention on the attack above them. She activated her telekinesis once more as the attack descended down at them. It inched to a stop just above the prison. "Break us a way out of here." Yumi said. "I can't hold this thing forever."

"With what?" She said whipping the icy walls with her lasso. "There's nothing around here for me to use. No trees, no rocks, and my whip isn't doing much either." She said lashing out at the structure once again.

Aelita's head slowly lifted from the cold ground to find a one-sided fight going on in front of her. She could see her doppelganger hovering ahead a giant ice ring. And she recognized Yumi's telekinesis holding the energy ball above it. 'Which means she and possibly Emillie are sitting ducks.'

'Aelita. You've got ten life points left.' Jeremie's voice sounded off in her ear. 'You need to get to the tower. They're just playing their part, you know that.'

"You're right... as usual." Aelita said. "But that beating was rough. But I can't even feel my wings right now." She said. "I think they're pretty much vestigial at this point." A loud crashing sound sounded off behind her and she turned to see the ice ring retreating back into the ground slowly. Revealing nothing where her friends once stood. "Was that...?"

'Yumi and Emillie. Yeah. You have to get in the tower, now!' Jeremie answered.

~Kadic Academy: Basement~

William, still supporting Mr. Belpois on his shoulder, quickly closed the final distance between him and the door to the old science building. "Here it is." He said. "Ulrich, you coming?!"

"Don't push it!" Ulrich's voice called back. William smiled and kicked down the old, run-down door with relative ease. A bunch of people inside flinched but soon relaxed. William carefully placed Mr. Belpois up against the wall.

"William! Finally!" Mr. Klotz yelled stepping forward. "I was beginning to think you didn't make it." He said. "What happened to him?" He said kneeling down next to Michael. "His clothes are... _singed_?"

"Don't know. Found him like this." William lied. He looked around the room. Hundreds of people all scrunched into the cold, dimly lit, lab together. It definitely looked like a big enough group to be everyone, but there was only one way to be sure.

Finally, Ulrich appeared at the beaten down door, back to the crowd. He was lugging his dad around rather carelessly. Mr. Stern's upper half was being held up by Ulrich, but the bottom half was being dragged on the floor as Ulrich pulled at his father's armpits. He threw his dad onto the floor next to Jeremie's.

"Ulrich!" Sissi cried. She rushed forward and hugged him tightly. "I was so worried about you, dear! I told them to let me go looking for you but they said it was just too dangerous!"

Nicholas scratched his forehead lightly. "I don't remember her saying that." Laura subtly smacked Nicholas upside the head, causing him to wince.

"How's our head count?" William asked.

"Well, now that you four are here, we've got nearly everyone. There are a few stragglers, though." Mr. Klotz reported. "Where's Jeremie? You said you were going to look for him too. Is he..." Mr. Klotz declined to finish that sentence and just looked to William for an answer.

"He went to get help." Ulrich said stepping in. "We told him to come with us but he was hell-bent on saving the day."

"Well as long as he's okay... with him accounted for that just means we're missing... Stones, Knight, Ishiyama, Della-Robia, Deluc, Nurse Yolanda, and Jim."

"Nurse Yolanda and Jim?" Ulrich and William said in unison.

"They're missing?" Ulrich asked. "No one's heard from them?"

"Last we knew Yolanda was looking over Jim in the infirmary." Principle Delmas said. "We tried calling but for some reason there's no reception."

"Could be jamming communications somehow." Ulrich said scratching his chin. "Though I don't know who's even left to pull that off. And the infirmary is on the other side of campus. We'd never make it back alive."

"Doesn't mean we shouldn't try. Especially if Jim's still sick." William said. "If anyone could make it there and back, it'd be us." He said.

"The infirmary should be out of the way enough. As long as they don't make a scene the vehicles shouldn't go after them. They're not the target."

"Ulrich, why aren't you worried about your friends? Why haven't you said anything about Yumi?" Sissi asked eyeing him suspiciously. "They just said she wasn't here and you haven't even addressed it." She narrowed her eyes at him. "You're hiding something."

"What?! No, I'm not! Of course, I'm worried about Yumi! It's just... I know she can take care of herself!" He defended.

"No. You'd have been out that door the second he finished his sentence." Sissi said. "I know you better than anyone. What are you hiding?"

He knew he had to come up with something fast. "Fine! I'm not worried about Yumi because...she ditched. She's not on campus and she wasn't planning on coming back today. There was that new sci-fi movie that premiered today and she left." He said. Ulrich saw Principle Delmas write down a note on his little notebook and Ulrich took a step back towards William.

"Let's hope we get a return to the past out of this one." William muttered. "Otherwise you're in the doghouse big-time."

"And your other friends?" Sissi asked not relenting. "No one's heard from Odd or Aelita since this whole thing started. And those three newbies in your group... gone too."

"Why do you care so much?!" Ulrich snapped. "You don't even like them!"

"That's not true." Sissi retorted crossing her arms. "I happen to think rather highly of Emillie. And I suppose Patrick's not a _complete_ waste of a cute face. And while I don't particularly like the rest of them, I certainly don't want them _dead_! You on the other hand don't seem to have any worry in you. So, either, one: you've lost all your compassion and humanity since we last spoke, or, two: you're lying."

"Ulrich Gilbert Stern!"

"Crap." Ulrich groaned pinching the bridge of his nose. He turned around to find his father getting up off the floor. "Couldn't you have played dead for a little bit longer? I have enough problems right now!"

"You had better start explaining what happened!" He snapped. "Why aren't we in the principal's office right now, why is my memory so foggy and why is my favorite suit in ruins?"

"Uh let's see... not my biggest problem right now, probably because there's nothing in your head but business transactions, and, oh! I don't care. How's that for explaining?" Ulrich growled.

"Your middle name is Gilbert?" William asked not even trying to stifle his giggle. "Wow, dude."

Ulrich facepalmed himself. "There goes my second biggest secret," He gave a deep sigh. "Yes, my middle name is Gilbert. Laugh it up. But..." He turned around and stood on his toes to match William's height. He glared straight into William's eyes. "...Do not. Tell. Anyone."

"Not even Yumi?" William asked, genuinely disappointed.

"Especially not Yumi." He growled.

"Easy man." William said still giggling. He took a step back and raised up his hands in self-defense. "I won't tell anyone. I promise."

~Lyoko: Ice Sector~

With her wings out of commission, Aelita was sprinting across the ice as fast as she could. No one else left. If she gets shot, it's all over. As she kept the pace toward the tower, she turned her head around to see her edgy counterpart airborne and gaining on her. "Jeremie, I could really use an overwing right now!"

'No can do. Files on all our vehicles are missing, I'll have to recode them all.' Jeremie's voice responded. 'You're stuck on foot, sorry Aelita.'

She sighed heavily. "It's not your fault." She panted. As she got closer and closer to the activated tower, she began getting more and more worried as well because her copy was much faster that her. And at the rate she was going, she wasn't going to make it. "Do you know if it has any weaknesses?"

'No. I'll need to take a closer look at its data later.'

"I hate new monsters." She cursed. Aelita jumped up into the air, spun around one-hundred and eighty-degrees mid-air, and fired off a pink energy ball at her foe. The darker toned girl dodged effortlessly and Aelita repeated the process twice, firing off two more energy blasts.

The secondary shot hit the monster in the head, slowing down her progress. She quickly recovered, though and sped back up after Aelita. Fearing she wouldn't make it, Aelita put everything she had into her virtual legs and dove for tower that was now just within her reach, the monster still right behind her. Her face collided with the tower and she slowly phased inside, head-first. The monster made one last effort at Aelita's feet, now the only part of her not in the tower, but missed by less than an inch of space. The monster quickly pulled up and hovered in front of the tower, growling. It descended down to the icy ground and sunk down beneath the surface once more.

Inside the tower Aelita floated past the many lower platforms. After doing her trademark mid-air backflip she gracefully landed on the highest level and walked up to the screen suspended in midair at the center of the platform. She carefully rested her hand against the screen and held it there for a moment. "Tower..." The screen in front of her quickly typed up the words 'CODE : LYOKO' across the center of the monitor. "...deactivated." She finished happily. She turned around to see all the screens filled with ones and zeros descending down the tower walls.

'That's it. I'm launching the return trip now.' Jeremie said. 'Return to the past... Now!' Aelita smiled again as everything around her turned to white. On the outside world the same was happening. Starting with the factory, and continuing to cover the school and spreading all the way across the world.

~Principle Delmas's Office~

~2:45 P.M.~

"This had better be the last conversation we ever have in this damned office." Mr. Stern said seriously. Across the room from him sat Ulrich, happier than the last time this scene played out... but not by much. Next to Stern sat Mr. Belpois. And across from him, his son. "Your reputation is to be your number one priority. Not your friends, not your girlfriend, not your games, your reputation. Understood?"

"Understood." Ulrich grumbled. "Though, you're not winning any brownie points having me forsake my friends for something as arbitrary as a reputation."

"Your chances are running out, young man. Know that the only reason I'm not dragging you out of here by the ear is because of the phone call I got earlier. I don't know how you got the Dean of Students to think so highly of you with your mediocre performances, but you did it." Joseph stood back up slowly. "Hopefully, this is a wakeup call for the both of you. I'm sure Mr. Belpois is also expecting nothing but A's from here on out as well." He said turning to his counterpart.

Michael Belpois just shrugged. "Actually," He chuckled. "I could care less about GPA's and reputations. I'm sorry if I gave you the impression that I was mad at my son, Mr. Stern, but I'm not."

"You're not?" Jeremie and Ulrich asked in unison. The looked to each other and back to Michael.

"What are you on about, dropout?" Mr. Stern quipped.

"Like you said. I'm a dropout. Who am I to scold anyone about grades? As long as Jeremie's happy, I'm happy. If he's happy being a D student, so be it. I just came to make sure he was okay." He answered honestly. "Jeremie enjoys getting high marks. Him getting a lower score worried me because I thought he might be in a sort of depression, not because of his behavior."

"Thanks dad." Jeremie said getting up. He walked over and gave his old man a hug. "I'm fine. I promise."

"I'll never understand how one could be okay with low scores." Mr. Stern said shaking his head.

"And just so we're clear. I've met the majority of Ulrich's friends. I think he has great taste." Mr. Belpois added. "Aelita has stayed with my family for multiple holidays, and she's always so sweet. And the times I've seen your son as well as Odd and Yumi, they've been nothing but a delight as well. Maybe go a bit easier on them, and they'll open up."

"Don't suppose you'd be willing to trade? Just for a day?" Ulrich pleaded. Jeremie, still hugging his father, just shook his head.

"I meant what I said Ulrich. If I end up getting called here again, there'll be hell to pay." Mr. Stern said. "And not even the prime minister could save you." With his peace said he exited through the door giving a respectful handshake to Principle Delmas before leaving.

"Well son," Mr. Belpois started getting up out of his chair as well. "I'd better get back home. I don't want to keep you from your school work. And your mother will be thrilled to know nothing's wrong." He smiled. He ruffled his son's hair with one hand and chuckled to himself. "It was good to see you again, Ulrich." He said waving goodbye.

"You too Mr. Belpois." Ulrich said. As soon as he was out the door and gone, Ulrich turned back to Jeremie. "No seriously, how much money would it take? Just for an hour?"

"More money than you've got that's for sure." Jeremie quipped. "Now come on, the others are probably already waiting for us. We need to go over you know what." He and Jeremie both moved towards the door.

"Oh, I forgot to thank you for breaking out the old voice emulator." Ulrich said. "Why we never thought of that the first time, I'll never know."

"Anything to keep you here, Ulrich." Jeremie smiled. "It wouldn't be the same without you."

Ulrich and Jeremie exited the building as quickly as possible and made their way to their groups meeting place. The vending machines. The rest of their group was already there, waiting for the two. Yumi and William were sitting next to each other on the bench. Emillie and Odd were trying their best to get what the ordered out of the machines. Sam sat up against the wall off to the side of them, and Aelita and Patrick were standing in-between them all, keeping a lookout. As soon as they came into focus, Patrick waved his hand in the air, signaling the two boys.

Ulrich took his seat on the opposite side of Yumi, And Jeremie leant his side up against the wall, letting his bag hit the ground.

"All better?" Yumi asked Ulrich.

"For now. I'm more interested in this new monster X.A.N.A.'s created." Ulrich answered. "What do you know, Einstein?" He asked.

"I was up all morning analyzing its specs, and we may have a bit of a problem. I don't know how, but X.A.N.A.'s created a near exact replica of Aelita." Jeremie explained.

"So?" Yumi shrugged. "He's been creating fakes and impersonating us since the very beginning. Why is this so important?"

"This isn't the same thing as a polymorphic specter or an Illusion." Jeremie answered. "This Aelita is a near one hundred percent copy of our Aelita. Wings, energy fields, the works. If Aelita can do it, chances are so can this... Anti-Aelita. X.A.N.A. must've finally realized that his monsters alone can't stop us. So he's using us against us."

"I don't understand." William interrupted. "If she's a genetic duplicate, why isn't she a preppy, innocent, heroine? Shouldn't she act the exact same as Aelita?"

"He must've altered one of the genes in Aelita's makeup in order to make a more subservient copy. Just changing a single gene can morph her extraverted mind into a neurotic one. That's why it's only a near perfect copy. Ninety-nine-point nine-nine percent perfect copy."

"I think I'm getting better at nerd speech, I understood, like, half of that sentence. I still don't know what you're saying though." Odd cut in. "So, could you cut out the sciencey bits, and give me a simplified version?!" He snapped.

Jeremie let out an annoyed groan. "That was the simplified version, Odd."

"He's saying that X.A.N.A. must've figured that a perfect copy of Aelita would've had too much good in her. She would've mutinied to our side. So, he altered her DNA, even if it was ever so slightly, drastically changing her personality and destroying any moral compass she could've had." Emillie explained. "I'm sorry if you have trouble keeping up, Odd."

"Hey, everyone knows that I'm the morale of the group. Not the brains." Odd crossed his arms. "You guys expecting any more of me is on you."

"But why didn't the Anti Aelita go into the tower after Aelita?" Ulrich asked. "Couldn't it have stopped her?"

"Those towers were built specifically to respond to, X.A.N.A., my father and I only." Aelita explained. "My guess is that by altering the DNA strand, it caused the towers to view the creature as an outsider, not another me." She said.

"And how could he have even done all this?" Patrick asked not turning his gaze away from the rest of the campus. "It's just a computer. It couldn't have just had the knowledge to create that kind of monster, let alone do it."

"Exactly, Pat." Jeremie said. "Aelita spent more than a decade locked in Lyoko. Most of it unconscious, but X.A.N.A. still had ample opportunity to analyze and dissect Aelita's makeup."

"So not only has this thing been attacking you for years, he's been creeping on Aelita for over a decade?" Patrick asked.

"Well I'd love to stay here and talk more about how screwed we are, but William, Sam, and I have to get to History." She knelt down and gently shook Sam. "Sam we got to go to class." She said calmly.

Sam's eyes slowly opened. "...Tell the teacher I'm skipping." She said mid-yawn.

"The last time you had me do that he nearly hit me with a ruler." Yumi answered. She grabbed Sam's shoulders and pulled her to her feet. "You're coming with this time."

"Fine."

Yumi bent over and gave Ulrich a quick peck on the cheek. "We'll talk later, okay Gilbert?" She whispered. She stood back up and led Sam towards their classroom.

"Sure thing, Yumes." He smiled. Suddenly his eyes shot open. "What did you just call me?!" She just gave him a wave goodbye from across the way. He snapped his head towards William who was starting to walk away as well. Ulrich quickly grabbed his arm. "You said you wouldn't tell anyone!" He hissed.

"I didn't tell _anyone_. I told _Odd_. Who he tells is his business. Besides, she thinks it's cute, so it's more like a favor." William smiled. "See you later, pal." He began whistling and left to join Yumi and Sam.

"You." Ulrich said turning to Odd. "Are so dead." He cracked his knuckles.

"Hey. No one told me it was a secret!" Odd defended himself. "Besides I'm an unbiased party in all this. If you're angry then perhaps you'd be interested to know that William's middle name is Valery."

"You're kidding." Ulrich said, face softening. "It can't be."

"Not in the least. See? I have no side in all this." Odd quipped.

"How did you even figure that out?" Ulrich asked.

"Do you really want to know, or do you want to go spread the word?" Odd asked seriously. Ulrich opened his mouth to retort, but quickly shrugged it off and ran off muttering something about Milly and Tamiya.

Odd chuckled to himself. "I still don't see the big deal in all this." Odd said turning to Jeremie. "So X.A.N.A. created another monster. So, this time it looks like Aelita. Nothing changes. All we have to do is kick its face in." He finished with a punch into an open hand.

"Except that a computer program of X.A.N.A.'s nature shouldn't have the capability to make a genetic copy. Only physical look-alikes." Jeremie explained. "Which means either this functioning capacity is a bigger deal than we thought, or..." He sighed. "I wasn't the only one helping X.A.N.A. behind the scenes."

"Crap. Here comes Jim!" Patrick said turning around. "Ix-nay on the oko-lyay alk-tay." He whispered.

"'Scuse you?" Odd asked.

"It means shut up!" Emillie snapped putting her hand over his mouth.

Jim walked a little woozily in front of the group of nine and came to a halt in front of them. He looked down at Aelita who met his gaze and smiled. "Hi, Jim. Feeling better, now?" She asked. He just kept staring at her. She turned away uncomfortably and gave Jeremie a pleading look.

"Hey, Jim, you okay?" Jeremie asked. He stepped in front of Aelita and waved his hand back and forth. "Did you happen to wander out of the infirmary a little too early?" He asked. "I can help you back to Nurse Yolanda-"

Jim finally broke out of his trance. "Can you see Aelita, Belpois?" He asked, with no sign of sarcasm in his voice. Jeremie and Aelita shared a look and then Jeremie look back to Odd and Emillie who just shrugged. "Is she real?"

Jeremie let out an uncomfortable laugh. "Of course, she's real, Jim. She's been a student here for years now." He answered. "Now let's get you back to Nurse Yolanda." He said resting a hand on Jim's back.

Jim shrugged Jeremie's hand off. "What is Aelita?" Jim asked. "What is X.A.N.A.?" Jeremie's mouth hung open as he, Patrick, and Aelita stepped back towards Emillie and Odd. "My head says you know the answers." He said addressing the group. "What is X.A.N.A.?"


	4. Stressed Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The warriors tell Jim of their escapades now that he's started to remember X.A.N.A., but Delmas's new camera catches wind of Jim leaving Belpois's room and is not pleased. Meanwhile X.A.N.A. launches another attack and sicks an old friend on Aelita.

Emillie sat at her desk in her dimly lit dorm room, surrounded by an endless sea of textbooks and notepads. As she flipped through them slowly, she muttered to herself angrily. “A test in Chemistry, a test in West Civ. and a test in Art History.” She huffed. “Even without X.A.N.A., how in the heck do they expect anyone to cram this quickly?” Luckily, she didn’t have any roommates, so talking wasn’t a problem. “And how the heck can the rest of them skip out on this and still be enrolled here?” She growled.

Emillie was getting her first taste of how far back X.A.N.A. can set one’s schooling career. “I could’ve been born with a 189 I.Q. like Einstein, but noooo. He gets to just blow off studying whenever he wants and still get better grades than me, while I die of stress.” She scanned through her papers. “At this pace I’m only going to be prepared for two of them by morning.” As soon as she pressed her pencil back down, the lead tip snapped off and flew back into her eye. She let out a frustrated growl and snapped the piece of wood in half before throwing it over her shoulder angrily.

A loud buzz went off from inside her pockets and she pulled out her phone slowly to see Odd’s name flashing in red. She growled and opened up her phone. “What do you want?”

‘Wow. I know I have a certain effect on the ladies, but that was fast.’ Odd’s voice sounded off. ‘Something wrong? You were supposed to meet up with us half an hour ago so we could discuss things with Jim.’

“Look, I really don’t have time for this right now.” Emillie groaned. “I’ve got three tests tomorrow, only one of which I’m relatively ready for, and you’re the last person I want to talk to right now. I’ve already got enough stress. Just do whatever without me and fill me in tomorrow morning.” She growled.

“ Oh come on.” Odd persisted. “Would you really rather study in your room alone over meeting up with me and the rest of your friends?”

“Odd, I swear. I swear to whatever cruel deity is out there, I will kick you in the nuts if you don’t let me study.”

“I’m just trying to look out for you, buddy!”

“Leave. Me. Alone. Odd.” She hung up on him before he could say another word.

Back in Jeremie’s room, he, Odd, Ulrich, Sam, Patrick, and William were scattered across the room with Jim sitting in the middle. Jeremie was sitting in his chair, Patrick and Sam were sitting on the former’s bed while Odd and Ulrich sat on Jeremie’s, and William had his back up against the door, as a precaution in case someone tried to walk in.

“Well?” Jeremie asked.

“Yeah she’s not coming.” Odd reported pocketing his phone. “She said to just fill her in first thing in the morning. She doesn’t sound too good either. Maybe someone should go check up on her.” Odd suggested.

“Then do it.” Ulrich said immediately. 

“Not me.” Odd defended. “You didn’t hear her tone, but that would be equal to giving an injured mouse to a feral cat. And I’m not the cat!”

“I’m sure Emillie’s fine.” Sam said. “She’s just cramming. Once those tests are done with, she’ll be back to normal. But  Jim’ll be here any second, and we still don’t have a consensus. We’d be putting his life in danger.”

“He’d become an immediate target for X.A.N.A.” William nodded. “He can’t defend himself like we can.”

“The return trips won’t work on him anymore.” Jeremie argued pushing up his glasses. “He can’t live in blissful ignorance like everyone else anymore. At this point not telling him would put him in more danger.”

“He deserves to know.” Ulrich agreed. “He’s done way more than he realizes.”

“No one’s arguing that he doesn’t deserve it, but his safety has to come before glory.” Sam said. “Otherwise what are we even fighting for here?”

“If we don’t tell him, what would happen?” William asked looking up at Jeremie. Jeremie met his eyes and looked down sadly.

“I don’t know for sure. But...” He said slowly. “If I had to guess, I’d say it’s possible if he doesn’t get clarification, and these alternate timelines keep colliding in his head... well best-case scenario; it’s mildly annoying and he moves on with life. Worst-case, however, he could go completely insane from trying to connect the dots himself. From the details he gave us, these are at least six to ten alternate timelines all existing in his head. If he tries to makes sense of anything, it’d be like a puzzle with no answer.”

“I... guess we can’t risk that.” Sam said.

“But this is just as big a risk. What if he doesn’t believe us. He could send us all to shrinks, or worse tell the principle we’ve been skipping class to fight an ‘imaginary monster’. We’d be outed immediately.” William argued. 

Suddenly there was a knock from behind William. Patrick quickly got up and opened the door just a sliver to see who it was. He quickly found Jim staring back at him. He turned around and nodded to Jeremie before opening the door all the way. Jim slowly stepped inside to seven pairs of eyes staring at him. “You may want to sit down for this. Odd give him your spot.” Jeremie ordered.

Odd grumbled and stood up slowly. He plopped down on the floor in front of Sam and Patrick and crossed his legs in front of him. Suddenly, his eyes lit up and he pulled out his phone again and pointed it at Jim.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Sam asked.

“If we have photo evidence of him being in our dorms after hours, he’ll never be able to scold us for doing  anything ever again!” Odd chuckled. 

“Odd! We’ve had this talk before! No blackmail!” Ulrich snapped. “Put your phone away before I break it!”

“I was just kidding! Jeez, I was trying to lighten the mood because you guys all look like someone died.” He explained.

“Okay,  Belpois . I did what you asked. I waited until after hours, but it is a school night so make it quick and then I want everyone here back in their own rooms.” He ordered. 

“Of course, Jim. Thanks again for doing it our way. I’m just  gonna go ahead and warn you, what we’re about to tell you sounds stupid, but it’s one hundred percent true. First off, Aelita. She is real. She’s a real human being.”

“But I have this memory-”

“Yeah. I know.” Jeremie interrupted. “That memory is from a reversed timeline. And at that point we didn’t know she was human either. But she is. I promise.”

“And that’s the end of the easy part of this conversation to understand.” Ulrich cut in. “But we should really be starting with X.A.N.A., not Aelita. Do you remember a man named Franz Hopper?”

“Of course!” Jim said, eyes lighting up. “He was like a mentor to me during my first couple years here as an educator.” Jim said happily. “He showed me the ins and outs of every part of this job.” His smile faded away quickly into a frown. “But one day... the old coot didn’t show up for work. And no one’s heard from him since.” 

“He was... your mentor?” Ulrich asked. “Oh... damn.” 

“Okay. That makes this a lot harder to tell you.” Jeremie said rubbing the back of his head. “You see... X.A.N.A. is a hyper intelligent, murderous computer program that Franz created.” Jeremie admitted. Jeremie was a but put off by the immediate look of horror on Jim's face. “But you should know he never meant for it to be an evil  program; he just gave it too much intelligence.”

“Franz... created X.A.N.A.?”

“Yes.” Odd added. “But again, he is one of the good guys.” Odd reassured. “He was on the run from the government and in a last-ditch effort, sent himself and his only daughter into the supercomputer X.A.N.A. inhabits for safety.”

“He didn’t have a daughter.” Jim spoke up. “He couldn’t have. Never saw anyone on a bring your daughter to work day, no photos, no stories, I was closest to him out of everyone. I would’ve known.”

Jeremie sighed and pulled out his phone. He slid his finger across the screen a couple times before tossing his phone across the room. Jim caught it swiftly and checked the screen. “What the...” On the screen was a picture of the same man who had mentored him in front of a chalkboard. And on his lap was... “That girl... it’s Aelita. You can’t mean...”

“Yes. My guess is the less people who knew about her, the less danger she would’ve been in, so he kept to himself. Then one day I found the supercomputer and subsequently, Aelita.” Jeremie explained.

“That would mean that Aelita is... around 24 years old.” Jim said.

“In a literal sense, yes.” Jeremie admitted. “But as far as her maturity goes, and even arguably from a biological standpoint, she’s still the same age as us. Ninety nine percent of her time spent on  Lyoko , she was unconscious for. While she existed, she didn’t gain anything  physically or mentally for nearly a decade. More importantly, we found a way to bring her to our world using something called Code: EARTH.”

“We  thought we could just shut down the computer then and there, But X.A.N.A. keeps finding ways to stick around,” Ulrich added. “Which brings us to our mission. Whenever X.A.N.A. activates a tower on  Lyoko as many of us as possible drop what we’re doing and go into the supercomputer to fight him and his monsters. Normally somebody ends up staying here in the real-world taking care of whatever X.A.N.A.’s attacks do. Zombies. Meteors. Amnesia. Epidemics. There’s really no telling the extent of his powers.”

“Then we reverse time and undo the damage when needed. Aelita’s the only one who can deactivate the towers, though.” Patrick added. “Because of her deep connection to X.A.N.A. and  Lyoko .”

“Reversing time? So that’s what these memories are from? They’re what happened before you time traveled?”

“Yes. I’m sorry Jim. It’s not like we _like_ keeping secrets from everyone, but it’s a necessary evil.” Jeremie said sadly. “We understand if you’re upset but please try to understand. There are innocent people trapped on  Lyoko right now. If we shut it down and just ignore it, those people will die. X.A.N.A. won’t hesitate to kill them. Right now, we’re the only ones who can stop him.”

“And if we do ignore it,” William added. “someday someone  else’ll come along and reactivate the computer, and who knows, we might be dead by then. We have to deal with this now.”

“So, everyone here are your warriors?” Jim asked. 

“Us, Aelita, Emillie, and Yumi.” William said. “They wanted to be here but  Yumi’s having dinner with her family, Emillie’s studying...”

“And Aelita’s sleeping, she’s got to get up early tomorrow to meet with a new band to sign on with.”  Jeremie explained.

“You’ve all been in all-out war for years?” Jim asked.

“Yep.” Jeremie affirmed.

“Right under our noses?”

“Uh-huh.” William nodded. 

“And somehow all of you have survived this far?”

“So far.” Patrick finished for Jim.

“How dangerous in X.A.N.A.?” Jim asked. 

“On a scale of one to ten?” William asked. “About a thirty. Left unchecked he would easily destroy the world.”

“How many more people know about this?” Jim asked. “Surely you’ve told some form of authorities.”

“You’re it.” Jeremie said shaking his head. “The government is what caused this mess in the first place, whatever they were hunting down Hopper for, they were thorough enough to cause him to develop a whole new world just to get away.”

“If I know secret government agents, and my grandad was one, the second we spill, they either, one; imprison us and cover all this up, two; torture us and cover all this up, or three; kill us and cover all this up.” Sam said confidently as she counted off the possibilities on her fingers. “Trust me on this.”

“So where does that leave me?” Jim asked. “Is this going to be a situation where if I step out of line, you’ll erase my memories again?”

“What?” Ulrich asked. “No! Jim, what kind of monsters do you think we are?!” He said slightly offended. “We’re telling you because, we talked it over and we think we can trust you. You’ve helped us before. And we never liked the fact that we had to excise you. We aren’t asking anything from you.”

“What are you kids going to do if I go to the authorities? It wouldn’t be right to let you guys just keep going on suicide missions. I could end everything you guys are doing in a second.”

“That’s your choice.” Odd looked up at him. “If you do decide that you need to tell someone, we’ll figure something out ourselves. We’ve been resourceful enough to make it this far.” He said happily.

Jim paused for a moment. He knew better than that. These kids had already been doing this for years. His guess is they already had a plan for him blabbing. He looked back to the picture of Franz and Aelita. All this time he’d been wondering what happened to Franz, his own daughter was hiding right under his nose, just like she was invisible. “Is Franz still alive?”

Jeremie looked down. Aelita was in her room so there was no reason to sugarcoat anything. “Honestly?” He said looking back at Jim. “I seriously, seriously, doubt it. It’s possible a piece of him is still somewhere on  Lyoko , but the more I look, the more pessimistic I get. But I owe it to Aelita to at least keep searching.” He said. 

Jim stood up slowly. He let out a deep breath and looked around at the group. “I don’t know kids. I appreciate the honesty, but you can’t drop bombs like this and expect an immediate answer.” Jim said putting his hands on his hips. “I’ll keep my mouth shut for now, but I need time to mull this over in my head.” 

“I understand. Before you go, however,” Jeremie launched himself off of his chair and grabbed a little handheld temp-check device from his desk. He strode up to Jim calmly and dragged it through the air in front of Jim. “I need to check something.”

Seconds later Jim exited the  Belpois’s room and turned around to see Sam, William, Odd, and Ulrich scurry out of the room as well. Sam heading for the girl's floor, and the rest heading to their own dorms on the level. Above Jim a small camera lens zoomed in towards him.

~Kadic Campus~

~8:00 A.M.~

Aelita and Jeremie stood at the gate to the school. “You really didn’t have to sneak out of class just to see me off.” Aelita said happily. “It’s not like I don’t know where I’m going. It’s just a couple blocks away.”

“I know. But I wanted to.” Jeremie replied. He wrapped his scrawny arms around Aelita and she followed suit resting her head on his shoulder. “Good luck, and remember to call me if they ask for birth certificates or anything like that.”

“I will.” She promised. “You do the same. I want to be the first to hear about any activity you know who might be stirring up.”

“Wouldn’t have it any other way.” The two separated and Aelita picked up her pink bag and slung it over her shoulder. She and walked backwards and waved goodbye to Jeremie as she stepped over the campus lines. He let out a deep sigh. 

“Jeremie  Belpois !” The voice of Mr. Klotz called. Jeremie turned to see the aforementioned teacher running towards him, panting heavily.

“This isn't be good. He’s gonna find out I’m cutting.” Jeremie said. He put on his best fake smile and walked towards the man running toward him. “Hi, Mr. Klotz!” He greeted. “Sorry, if I confused you, I was just seeing Aelita off. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Oh, yes you are. To the principal's office. Now!” He ordered. “Principal Delmas has demanded to see you and your troublemaking friends immediately!  You're in deep this time.”

‘He wants to see everyone? Jim must have told.’ Jeremie thought to himself. He felt Klotz’s hand on his shoulder and he dipped his head. ‘Okay, Jeremie, you’ve prepared for this, as soon as you’re back with the others execute plan A.’ 

Klotz dragged him across campus with a vice grip around his arm. As Jeremie dejectedly kept up with the man, the two passed Emillie and Yumi both sitting on the ground outside the art room. Surprisingly Klotz just ignored the two girls and kept moving. Emillie quickly took notice of this. “Jeremie!” She called. She and Yumi both rushed forward to catch up with them. 

“Ishiyama. LeDuc.” Mr. Klotz said acknowledging them. “Please go back to your studies. Young Belpois has some explaining to do with the principal.” Suddenly, Mr. Klotz caught a glimpse of William stalking out of the art room with a paper in hand, grumbling to himself.

“Stupid class. Who cares _when_ The Treachery of Images was painted? All that matter is it _was_! Tests are so stupid.” He muttered crumpling up the paper in his hand. 

“Dunbar! Quit with the angst and get over here!” Mr. Klotz ordered. 

“Wait, Yumi and Emillie aren’t in trouble?” Jeremie asked. 

“Of course not.” Mr. Klotz deadpanned. “Why would they be? Hurry it up, Dunbar!”

William slid his hands into his pockets and scoffed. “Yeah, I’m  comin ’.” He grumbled. 

“Mr. Klotz, what did they do?” Emillie asked. “Where’s Jim? Didn’t he take back his duties now that he’s feeling better? Usually he brings people to Delmas.”

“Jim has been temporarily stripped of his position.” Mr. Klotz reported quickly. “No time for details, kids, I’m already running behind.” He gave both Jeremie and William a push on their backs in an attempt to get them to start moving again. 

“ _Jim_?” Yumi questioned. 

Jeremie quickly took his bag off his shoulder and tossed it at Yumi. She flinched for a second, but reached out her arms and the bag fell right into her grasp. “Watch over things!” Jeremie called. Emillie and Yumi shared a quick look before turning back to the three boys heading towards the office.

After the long, silent walk to the office, Klotz wasted no time with the office staff and led the two boys straight into Delmas’s space. The second the door opened Jeremie and William were met with Ulrich, Odd, Sam, and Patrick standing in a horizontal line in front of Delmas and Jim standing ahead of them.

“Join the line you two.” Mr. Delmas said, clearly annoyed. Jeremie took a spot next to Odd and William followed suit, stand to Jeremie’s left. “Now that all of you are here, we can begin. Now does any one of you want to tell me why I have photo and video evidence of Mr. Morales in  Belpois’s dorm room after hours?”

“Odd!” William hissed. “What the hell?” He whispered.

“Seriously, William? I was joking! I didn’t do anything!” Odd whispered back angrily.

“I may be old, but I’m not deaf.” Their principal cut in. “It was not Della Robia who tipped me off to this... incident. After Jeremie’s last after hour infraction I had some cameras installed throughout the dorm halls. And one caught an intriguing shot of Mr. Morales entering the Belpois’s room, well after midnight and leaving along with the rest of you soon later.”

Jim cringed slightly. He knew he was screwed because Principal Delmas was calling him ‘Mr. Morales’. No one's ever called him that since his first week here. Everyone knows he hates being called that. “Sir, if I may-”

“You may not!” Delmas snapped. “Don’t you have any idea what you’ve just done, you fool?” He got up out of his desk chair and strode up to Jim. “Tell me Mr. Morales, what is rule 22 and why do we have it? A member of the disciplinary squad should be able to manage that.”

“Rule 22 states that all students must retire to their dorms starting at 10 PM sharp, and following that curfew no student, faculty, or visitors may move between the floors until 6 AM the next morning, unless under an emergency.” Jim replied robotically. He was of course, the entire disciplinary squad. “It was put in place for multiple reasons, but the main reason was so that no...” He let out an embarrassed cough. “immoral activity between students ensues, such as graffiti, theft, or... you know... given that these kids are sixteen to eighteen and in various relationships...” 

“Very good. You can stop.” Delmas interrupted. “Now can you tell me what might happen if word got out that a staff member visited six students in a student’s dorm room after curfew? Do you realize how that looks?” He asked as calmly as possible. “You and I have known each other for a near decade, but you must realize that once I’ve seen something like that... I can’t just slap your wrist.”

“ So we don’t tell anyone.” Odd answered immediately. “Boom! Problem solved. While we’re on the subject of solving problems, this little meeting has caused us to miss breakfast, so-”

“Della-Robia, another word and you’ll spend the rest of your academic career in detention!” Delmas boomed. Odd, ignoring his growling stomach, lowered his head in compliance.

“Mr. Delmas, search our room.” Patrick offered, “You’ll find nothing out of the ordinary. I swear. Unless you count Odd’s odor that hasn’t left the  spot, he was sitting in.” He snarked. Sam and Odd let out a short snicker before recomposing themselves.

“You think this is _funny_?” Delmas asked. “I assure you, it’s not.”

“You don’t understand Mr. Delmas!” Ulrich interjected. “Really-”

“I expected more out of _you_ most of all. I thought you learned your lesson.” Delmas said walking up to Ulrich. “Your father’s already been called. He’ll be here tonight to pick you up. Permanently.” Ulrich’s eyes widened. He hung his head down, knowing a call from ‘the dean’ wouldn’t help him now. “This isn’t some first time offenders teepeeing the cafeteria. I was quite clear with Jeremie and Ulrich the last time they were here. No more. I’ve written up extensive e-mails on the rest of you as well. And unless someone gives me the best reason for breaking a rule ever, I’m sending them to your parents. Now.” Odd had been in here countless times and he had never seen Delmas this upset. Never near this intimidating either. He shrunk back a little.

“We were trying to help him.” Odd said meekly. “We knew he wasn’t feeling well so the six of us banded together. We had found a solution for his problems.”

“Really? I’m intrigued. You did what Nurse Yolanda couldn’t?” Delmas inquired.

Odd laughed nervously. “Amazing what a short Google search can do, huh?”

“I see. Tell you what. I’m going to hand all six of you a piece of paper. And you are, without talking to each other, going to write down what the solution to his problem was. If all six answers match, then I’ll forget the whole thing.” Delmas said never wavering. 

~Cafeteria~

“Ugh!” Emillie growled. “Yumi, did you get answer twelve right?” She asked desperately. 

“You mean the question about Starry Night?” Yumi asked. “Yeah. Why?”

“Starry Night!” She cried out slamming her head against the table. “I knew it was obvious.” She muttered. “Van Gough is so stupid. _I’m_ so stupid.”

“Easy Emillie. It’s just a test.” Yumi said reassuring her. “A test for a class above your grade level, that you qualified for because you have such good grades. Believe me, failing an art test is nothing to be worried about.”

“Failed? I got a 96! But I could’ve gotten a 98 if I had just studied for that last hour instead of sleeping!” She cried. “My parents would be so ashamed.”

“Your parents would be mad you got a 96 percent on a test about art from the 1800’s? You ever show them where you’re ranked among all the students here? You’re in the Big Ten! You know? The ten students with the highest GPA’s across Kadic?” 

“Hello Eleven.” Yumi and Emillie look up at Laura staring back at them. “So sorry about that. I know I’m still considered the new girl, so I hope you don’t hate me for being the one to knock you out. I just can’t stand not being at the top. You understand.” She slipped Emillie a sheet of paper and strutted away.

“Crap!” Emillie cursed. She tossed the paper over to Yumi and growled in frustration. “See that? That’s why I needed a 98!”

Yumi instantly recognized the paper. It was a listing of every student's GPA. Kadic’s never been shy about using negative reinforcement to motivate students, so GPA’s do get shared quite a bit, but only a faculty member could get a full expansive list like this. There she was. Emillie  LeDuc . Eleventh overall for Kadic academics. “Did she really use Sissi’s status as the principle’s daughter just to rub it in your face?” She shook her head before looking behind her. Laura was sitting at Sissi’s table happily eating a sandwich while Herve hung off her every word. She crumbled up the piece of paper and threw it onto the ground.

“You want me to go beat her up for you?” Yumi offered. “They might dock your GPA if you do it, but I’m already on the back half.”

“No. We’re already down to only two warriors. I don’t want them locking you up, too. I’ll just have to try twice as hard next time.” She said sadly. “That’s what Ma always taught me.”

“You spent the previous twenty-three hours before the test doing nothing but studying. What are you  gonna do? Make the days longer?” Yumi prodded. “Maybe you should just let your hair down. We could go scope out a boy for you.” 

“I’ve got no time for boys.” Emillie said standing up. “Western Civilization has to kick my metaphorical butt first, then it’s off to Chemistry for a proper funeral.” She grabbed her bag and slung it around her shoulder. “See  ya , Yumi.”

“Alright. But if you change your mind and want to gawk at boys instead, let me know.” Yumi pulled out her phone and dragged her finger across the lock screen, a picture of her and Ulrich, dispelling it. “She really needs a girl's night.”

As Emillie exited the cafeteria she pulled out a notebook filled with her history notes and started flipping through them. “If I’m lucky, I can get one more skim through before class starts and maybe come out of this with a C. She looked up as a large cloud of purple mist scattered around her, converging on her nose.  As she walked forward, nose buried in her notebook, she carelessly bumps into another person knocking all of her notes onto the ground. Heidi slowly turned around and looked down at Emillie. 

“I’m so sorry, Heidi.” Emillie apologized, gathering all of her papers together. “I should’ve been looking where I was going, I’m just so flustered right now and-” She tucked away the last paper into her grasp and looked up just in time to dodge a rusty crowbar swinging down at her. She dropped all her papers once again and rolled to the left. “What is wrong with you!?” She screamed as Heidi pulled the crowbar off the ground. Emillie suddenly noticed two more students walking towards them. “...Oh right. X.A.N.A.”

Emillie slowly got to her feet dodging another swing from Heidi. “Heidi, I get that this is probably not your fault, but if you swing that at me one more time-” Before she could finish her sentence, she ducked under another swing. “Alright, friendship’s on hold.” She reeled back her fist and thrusted it forward into the center of Heidi’s face, knocking the girl down to the ground. Emillie felt an intense force hit her lower back and she quickly dropped to her knees. Behind her Anais stood twirling around a hammer. 

As Anais prepared for another strike, Emillie noticed, from right outside her field of vision, a black boot collide with Anais’s face sending the girl backwards. Yumi quickly knelt down and wrapped Emillie’s arm around her shoulder. “I got you.” Yumi said. “We  gotta get inside. Come on.” 

Yumi dragged Emillie inside as fast as she could and slammed the door behind her. As she pushed Emillie down onto one of the chairs on the inside of the school, she noticed Herve and Nicolas walking by. “Hey, you two!” She said getting their attention. “Barricade that door!” Yumi ordered. 

“Why would we do that?” Nicolas asked. “We’re not supposed to move the furniture y’now?”

“I don’t have time for questions, just do it!” Yumi snapped. “I need you to stay here and make sure they barricade it right, okay Emillie? I’m going to go to the principal’s office and get everyone else. Call Aelita too.”

“Sure. Thanks for the save by the way. How’d you know I was in trouble?” Emillie asked.

“I saw some weird purple stuff engulf two students, and then they just started fighting like animals. Sissi tried to stop them, but she got too close and started raging herself.” Yumi explained. “Which reminds me, stay away from the cafeteria. I managed to lock them all in there.”

“Is this good?” Nicolas’s voice sounded. Yumi turned around to see that the two boys had managed to move a single seating couch in front of the double doors. 

“How is one couch a barricade?!” Yumi yelled. “Keep going!”

~C&T Recording Studio~

Aelita was currently being led down the hall by an elderly gentleman, who had introduced himself as Mr. Teller, passing many different rooms, most filled with recording equipment, mixers, and enough foam to last a lifetime. She was a little awestruck. The  Subsonics never used a recording studio like this. 

“The sudden disbandment of the  Subsonics was a shock to everyone.” The elderly man said sadly. “But this is the way of the music business. Creating a band is too personal a job not to expect this kind of thing left and right.”

“I suppose so.” Aelita commented. 

“However, the boys of Revved Out are excited to meet you.” He continued. “They’ve all taken quite a liking to your sound.” 

“Thank you very much sir.” Aelita said blushing. “I still feel like I know so little though.”

“Well I’d reckon you know more than most girls your age.” The man said sweetly. “The boys should be right down this hallway. Danny can be a little overbearing but you’ll get used to it.”

Aelita heard a faint noise coming from her coat pocket. It slowly grew louder and louder. She reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone before quickly answering it. “Hello? ...Emillie?”

‘Hey Aelita. Sorry, but you-know-who came out to play. He’s already taken control of a bunch of the students.’

“Where’s Jeremie?” Aelita questioned. 

‘Everyone but me and Yumi got taken to Delmas. We have no idea why. Yumi went to crash the party, but we need you too.’

Aelita sighed pinching the bridge of her nose. “Why can’t I have just _one_ day? Okay. I’ll be right there.” She promised. “Where do you want to meet up?”

‘The mouth of the timber. Oh, and if you see any purple smoke, don’t let it near you. It’s making people go insane and get real violent.’

“I understand.” She hung up and pocketed her phone. She turned back to the elder man. “I’m terribly sorry, sir. But I have to go.” She slung her bag back over her shoulder. “Give Revved Out my deepest apologies if you would.” She pivoted around and took off.

“Miss Aelita! It’s now or never!” The man called. There was a tinge of sadness in his voice. Of course, the world could stop for X.A.N.A. but not for her. She frowned and kept running forward. She  shoved the screen door open and stepped outside the studio. 

She was immediately met with a tall man dressed in black and white stripes. His head was shaven and his cheap glasses were cracked. Aelita didn’t want to believe it, but she instantly recognized the man. “Peter Duncan?” She took a step back slowly. Mr. Teller opened the door behind her and walked out the studio.

“Miss Aelita, I beg you to reconsider.” He pleaded.

Duncan pulled out a switchblade from seemingly nowhere and spun it around in his hand. “Get back inside!” Aelita snapped turning around. Seeing Teller frozen with fear she quickly shoved him back through the push screen door and onto the floor of the building. She heard Duncan let out a grunt and instinctively ducked barely making it under the switchblade he plunged towards her. Teller let out a final scream before running further into the studio.

The escaped criminal grabbed Aelita by the neck and brought her up slowly into the air. “I’m sure that’s you in there X.A.N.A.,” She grunted. “ so I don’t need to...” She took one last large breath before kicking the convict in the nuts. His grip around her throat loosened and she dropped back to the ground. “...hold back.” She panted a little before taking off down the street. Duncan descended from the sky above her, to the ground right in front of her. 

Duncan effortlessly kicked her in the stomach, knocking her to her knees. He grabbed a chunk of her bright hair and pulled her head upwards so she was looking him in the eyes. “You die.” He said simply. Bringing his knife up to her neck and pushing it up against her skin, he flexed his muscles readying to slice, she looked up at his distorted face and growled. She slowly reached into her pocket and grabbed one of her pencils. Before Duncan could make another move, she whipped her arm around, stabbing the pencil into his ankle.

Duncan let out a cry of pain and dropped Aelita back down onto the sidewalk, before dropping to his knees and grabbing the wound. She pushed herself back onto her feet and brought her foot into his nose knocking him onto his back. She jumped over the man and took off down the street. She checked her surroundings once more, finding Duncan still on the ground and weirdly, no other people around. 

She pulled out her phone once more and quickly held down the one button.

~Delmas’s Office~

As principle Delmas ruffled through the six uniquely shaped pieces of paper he chuckled to himself, a knowing smirk came across his face, and Jim instinctively face-palmed. “Just as I thought. Six different answers.” He stated tossing them onto the floor. “Want to try telling the truth this time?”

Jeremie’s phone went off inside his pocket, and he reached for the device without a second thought for his situation. He checked the caller ID which read AELITA. “Excuse me, Principle Delmas. But it’s urgent.” He said politely.

“Put. The phone. Away.” Delmas ordered.

“But it’s Aelita! What if she needs something!?” Jeremie argued. 

“Jeremie Belpois, I don’t care if it’s Ghandi back from the dead, you answer that phone and there’ll be hell to pay.” Delmas threatened from across the room. Jeremie’s hand hesitated for a moment. 

‘She could be in danger you coward.’ He quickly opened up his phone anyway. “I’ll have to take that chance.” He brought the phone up to his ear. “Aelita? Are you okay?... Peter Duncan?” Odd and Ulrich snapped their heads toward Jeremie. “Okay. I’ll meet you there right away. Aelita was just attacked.” He said quickly. “I have to go!” He rushed out of the door before Delmas could say another word.

"Wait up, Jeremie!" Odd called. He stepped to run after him but Delmas grabbed his shoulder.

“If Aelita needs help she or Jeremie should call the authorities.” Delmas said stopping the boy in his tracks. “We’re solving this issue first. Normally under a situation like this, for your own education and your own safety, the best course of action would be to split you kids up.”

“You mean Jeremie and I won’t have classes together anymore?!” Odd panicked. 

Delmas shook his head at the boy. “One of you six can remain here a Kadic, while the other five are sent to separate boarding schools.” He explained. 

“You can’t do that!” Patrick interrupted. “It took years of begging to get my parents to send me here!” 

“And if I’m not attending Kadic, then my parents will start sending me to school with... my sisters.” He groaned. “I’ll never survive!”

“Then give me one good reason to keep you all here.” Delmas ordered. 

Suddenly, Yumi busted through the door with a forward kick. The door flung open and slammed against the adjacent wall. She rested her hands on her knees and panted for a second. “We  gotta go.” She huffed. 

“Miss Ishiyama! What is the meaning of this?! Did you just kick my door open!?” Delmas outraged. “Do I need to send you to a separate school as well?” He snapped. 

“No time for whatever you’re talking about.” She rushed forward and grabbed Ulrich and Odd’s wrists pulling them towards her. “Time to go.” Ulrich breathed, relieved he finally got to leave this dumpster fire of a meeting. Odd also nodded understandingly. 

Yumi quickly lead Ulrich out of the room with Odd, Sam, and William following closely behind. “Sorry, Principle Delmas,  we’ll explain everything later!” Patrick promised. “If we have to!” Patrick sprinted out of the room, too, leaving just Jim and Delmas.

Delmas slowly turned to Jim. “If you value what little part of your job you have left, you’ll go catch them and bring them back here, with Ishiyama this time!” He ordered. 

Jim frowned, but gave Delmas a salute before running off after them. 

Jeremie cautiously opened the backdoor of the gymnasium and peeked her head out slowly. As she checked around for any purple smoke, she spotted a blur of pink in the distance. “All clear. I think I see Aelita.”

“Let’s go then.” Patrick said pushing the other double door open. “We’ve gotta get to the factory.” They rushed out of the building and made their way towards the timber. “Does anybody smell rust?” Suddenly, as they passed the corner of the gymnasium building, a small cloud rounded the corner and enveloped Patrick. 

“Patrick!” Ulrich called. 

Patrick tried to wave the smog away, to no avail. It was like gusts of wind had no effect on it. “Go on!” Patrick responded. “I can already feel it!” He turned around and took off in the other direction. “Good luck!” He waved.

“Where’s he going?” Ulrich asked. 

“Hopefully trying to get as far away from us as possible before the effects kick in.” Yumi said. As the group kept moving, more and more smoke headed their way. Aelita finally came into focus, racing towards them on a bike they’d never seen before. She grabbed the brakes tight and skid to a halt in front of them.

“Everyone good?” Aelita asked. 

Odd laughed. “Are you kidding?!” He exclaimed. A small stray cloud of smoke snuck up behind him. “This has got to be the lamest X.A.N.A. plot  ev -” Sam effortlessly kicked him square in the back knocking him out of the reach of X.A.N.A.’s scheme. She began coughing immediately. 

“Sam! Oh, my Kiwi! I’m so sorry!” Odd said as Ulrich pulled him to his feet. “Come on, Sam! Fight it!” Sam dropped to her knees, holding her head tightly. “Fight it!” Ulrich peeked around Sam to see Patrick stalking towards them. 

“Guys, Pat’s back!” Ulrich informed them. 

“And that cloud looks a lot bigger than the other ones!” Aelita said. She pointed towards the campus where the entire school had been engulfed to the point where the sky itself was purple. “If we don’t get to  Lyoko now, we never will.” Everyone nodded and Jeremie, Ulrich, William, and Yumi took off into the timber without another word. Before Aelita could join them however, Sam grabbed her shoulder. Aelita turned around and Sam huffed a bit of smoke she had stored up when she breathed in straight into Aelita’s nose. 

Emillie grabbed Sam’s hand and yanked it off of Aelita. “Sam! Knock it off! You’re supposed to be the hard headed one remember?!” Aelita’s eyes shot back open and she pushed Emillie to the ground. The smoke quickly covered her entire body while she was still recoiling. Odd quickly dropped down and kick his foot underneath Sam’s, causing the girl to fall over. Before the smoke could get to him, Odd he quickly knocked Aelita out from behind and dragged her back.

“Sorry about this, Aelita.” He said as he slowly moved backwards into the woods. “Einstein’s  gonna kill me.” Aelita’s eyes slowly fluttered shut and she fell limp in his arms. While he loosened his grip around Aelita, Ulrich came through a brush behind him. 

“What’s taking so long?!” Ulrich boomed. He took a look at the cloud of X.A.N.A.’s schemes growing closer. “We  gotta go!” Odd thought for a moment. He quickly re-positioned Aelita into bridal style and carefully handed her over to Ulrich, who accepted her slowly.

“I’ll draw them away. Take Princess to the others.” Odd said. Through the corner of his eye Emillie and Sam slowly got off the ground. “Do it!” He ordered before Ulrich could pose any objections. He turned back to the girls. “They’re getting back up, if you don’t-” He turned back around and Ulrich was already gone. “Oh, Good.” He turned back to the girls just in time to see Sam’s fist and then... nothing.

XXXXX

Odd slowly opened his eyes to the gymnasium ceiling. As his consciousness flooded back to him and he began to remember everything, he jolted up in his spot and looked around. “The gym.” He said. “How did I get here?”

“Well you sure don’t stay down long.” Emillie’s voice called from behind him.

Odd whirled around to see Emillie walking towards him. He jumped to his feet and immediately took up a fighting stance. “Okay, X.A.N.A., round two isn’t going to be so easy.” He rushed forward and thrusted his arm at Emillie. Emillie ducked under his fist and dodged to the left of his immediate follow-up punch. 

“I’m not X.A.N.A. Odd! It’s me!” Emillie growled. 

“Yeah right! Prove it!” He demanded with another punch. This time she grabbed his fist midway through and once she had stopped his momentum, pushed him back. He instantly recovered coming at her again. “Tell me something only Emillie would know!”

“You idiot! If X.A.N.A. had taken over my mind, why would I have saved you?!” She snapped. “I would’ve left you with Sam and Patrick!” As he rushed her again. She jumped as high into the air as she could place a single hand on Odd’s head and used him to vault herself over him.

“Okay, there’s no way Emillie could pull off a jump like that.” Odd finally managed to land a punch right between her eyes, snapping her glasses in half. 

“My glasses!” Emillie shrieked. “What the hell, Odd?”

“What’s going on in here you two?!” Jim marched up to the two students quickly and stood between them. “Emillie what happened to your glasses?!” He said. 

“Dipstick over there has lost his mind!” Emillie raged.

“Don’t listen to her Jim! She’s possessed! She vaulted over me and did, like, three mid-air summersaults! That couldn’t be her!” Odd accused.

“Odd, do ever listen to what anyone else says for even just a minute?” Emillie asked. 

“Thirty seconds is my limit.” Odd replied quickly.

“I spent nine summers at an acrobatics camp.” She said through gritted teeth. “I talk about it all the time! I asked you if you would come with back when we were dating!”

“In my defense... I probably wasn’t listening.” He replied lamely.

“Easy there, kids,” Jim intervened. “We’ve got enough problems as it is. Let me see those glasses.” Jim knelt down next to her and offered his hand. Emillie carefully place the two halves in his hands. He reached into his pocket. He pulled out a roll of scotch tape and wrapped a piece around the breaking point. “This’ll have to do until we can get you a replacement.” He said standing up. “Now I need you two to stop the quarrels and listen to me.”

“I saw it!” Odd persisted. “The fog got her. She was on the ground and it covered her face! She’s possessed!”

“I’m telling you it didn’t affect me!” Emillie shot back. “I’m not even showing any of the symptoms! You’re the one attacking me!” 

“Because you’ve got my friend in your evil grasp!” Odd snapped.

“We’re not friends!” Emillie exploded. “We’re not friends. How Ulrich deals with your loud mouth all day and night  baffles me. In  fact, I don't even like you! But friend or not, I’m not your enemy!”

“I got to go with Emillie on this one.” Jim said quickly. He wanted to defuse this before it got any worse. “X.A.N.A.’s a program. From what I’ve been able to remember, he’s more straightforward. If he was in control, he had about ten chances to kill you since I got here, and nothing’s happened. I think she’s telling the truth.” He continued. Odd relaxed.

“Could still be a trick. A second tower.” He persisted. Jim set a hand on his shoulder. 

“We’ve got bigger problems right now.” Jim explained. “Everybody outside has already gotten caught up in all of this, and I saw a few running around indoors on my way here. They’re spreading whatever this is as we speak.”

“Any sign of Sam and Patrick?” Odd asked. 

“They went after Ulrich. Hopefully he was able to lose them.” Emillie explained.

“He’s fine. I’m sure of it.” Jim said. “He’s not the one I’m worried about. If they’re infected kids spreading this, then we need to find as many unaffected people as we can and hole up.” Jim suggested.

“For once I feel it’s best if we just stay here.” Odd suggested. “There’re too many out there to do any good. We have to trust that the others can deactivate the tower.”

“How long until you think they start pouring in here?” Jim asked.

“No telling. But it’d be best if we barricaded the doors.” Emillie said. “Unless you want to waste more time attacking each other.” She spat at Odd. 

“You have to admit, it’s suspicious.” Odd defended himself. He picked up a couple chairs from the closet and dragged them over to the double doors. He pushed them up against the doors wedging them shut. He turned around and eyed one of the DJ mixers they used for dances. “Hey Jim, help me out with that mixer.” The two of them managed to get the several hundred-pound machine up against the main doors. Emillie was on the other side of the gym barricading the second set of doors with a bunch of gymnasia equipment.

~ Lyoko : Mountain Sector~

Yumi and Ulrich slowly descended down onto the rocky surface below them. Yumi took a quick look around, checking for any monsters, while Ulrich drew both his swords. “Thank god we were able to lose those two in the sewers.” Yumi said, 

“Yeah but there’s no telling how long till they catch back up. We have to hurry up and deactivate this tower.” Ulrich said calmly. Above them William and Aelita virtualized into the virtual world. William dropped to his knees next to Yumi and Aelita fell limply and face planted on the ground.

“Aelita!” Yumi cried. She knelt down next to the pink haired girl and helped her up to her feet. 

“Careful, she could still be under X.A.N.A.’s spell.” William said drawing his  zweihander from his back carefully. He pointed the tip at her chest. 

Ulrich immediately grabbed the dull side of the large blade and pushed it down. “Are you crazy?! If you de-virtualize her now, we’ll be disarmed for twenty-four hours!” The limp form of Aelita slowly raised her left arm summoning a ball of pink energy to gather at her palm, and pointed it toward William.

“William...” She groaned. William quickly took a defensive stance and took a few steps back. As the energy ball grew in size, Ulrich looked ahead of them before tackling William to the ground forcefully. Aelita’s energy ball flew over the two boys and into the snout of a stray tarantula. The creature screeched loudly before exploding before their eyes. “... I’m me.”

“Well why didn’t you just say so?” William demanded from the ground. 

“You wouldn’t have believed me. When you get suspicious you become impossible.” She said holding her head gently.

“You okay, Princess?” Ulrich asked as he got back to his feet. William dejectedly followed suit after him, dusting off his suit and soon as he was stood straight. 

“I got a splitting headache, I can barely stand up straight, and my nose if filled with the smell of rust.” She explained. 

“Rust? Isn’t that what Patrick was babbling about right before he got infected?” William asked. 

‘It’s probably related to X.A.N.A.’s attack somehow.’ Jeremie’s voice rang inside their ears. ‘I’ll call Odd and let him know. Hopefully he was able to get out of there unaffected. In the meantime, you four need to head north. There only seems to be one tower this time. I’ll program you guys some vehicles up and... oh no.’

“What’s wrong Einstein?” Yumi asked. 

‘I’ve got a security feed up and it looks like Patrick and Sam right outside the elevator. And they brought our old friend Mr. Duncan. No time for programming. I need someone to come back. I won’t be able to hold them back myself.’

Without warning, a black and grey blur shot out of the ground below them. It spun around the air gracefully above them before settling down into a more stationary position, its wings still flapping in order to keep it airborne. “And there’s Anti-Aelita.” Yumi deadpanned. The monster scanned the four forms in front of it carefully, before locking on to Aelita. She burst forward towards the still weakened girl, but Yumi jumped forward and intercepted her mid-air taking her down with her. The two  skid across the rocky ground, still fighting for dominance. “Go! I’ll hold off this one!” Yumi ordered. 

Without another word, Ulrich scooped Aelita off the ground and super-sprinted off into the distance. “Hey!” William called sheathing his sword. “Hold on! Ulrich!”

As Yumi and Anti-Aelita struggled for dominance, Anti-Aelita conjured up a white and grey energy field and thrusted her open palm towards Yumi’s head, but the girl moved her head to the left before it could land. Yumi rested her feet on the monster’s stomach and kicked it off of her person, then flipped back onto her feet. “You know, I think a part of Aelita’s charm is the bright colors.” Yumi commented. “That and the innocence.  So, I’m not sure how you’re supposed to be a duplicate.” 

Anti-Aelita dipped back underground. Yumi took a few steps back and then did a full three-sixty turn checking her surroundings. “Come on out! I’m wide open!” Yumi called. “Maybe it-” The monster resurfaced behind her, shooting upwards and dragging the sharp ends of her wings up against Yumi’s back. She felt a tinge of pain and then a spreading numbness across her entire body. Anti-Aelita landed gracefully onto the ground. Looking back and no longer seeing Yumi behind her she flapped her wings once again and took off towards the other warriors. 

A few minutes later as she was gliding through the air towards the activated tower, another showed up, blocking her way. Ulrich pointed his katana at the monster and smirked. “You and me haven’t fought yet.” He said. “Show me what you got X.A.N.A.”

Anti-Aelita cocked her head to the left slightly and stared at the boy. She descended slowly not looking away from the boy. “Die.” She said simply before she fired off a large burst of energy in Ulrich’s direction. A large dust cloud exploded enveloping Ulrich. Anti-Aelita took a few steps forward preparing herself to take off once more.

“Oh, come on. That was like dodging a slug.” His voice came from behind her. Without looking  behind her, she instinctively ducked down onto her knee and felt a gust of wind above her. She knew it was his sword. It would’ve been the most logical attack given his position. She kicked back and knocked Ulrich away. She turned slowly to face the boy with dark eyes. 

Ulrich stood back up twirling his sword in his hand. “Good instincts. But you are a program, so it’s not really that impressive.” He mocked. Ulrich simply pointed up to the sky.

Anti-Aelita looked up to see the tip point of a second sword plummeting towards her. She summoned an energy field and reached her arm up. She easily caught the sword and used the summoned power to crush it into pieces. She shot forward at a speed Ulrich hadn’t seen any X.A.N.A. monster reach before and before he realized, Anti-Aelita's open hand was wrapped around his face. She quickly summoned up another energy field and Ulrich felt a searing pain all across his face. 

She released the energy with a burst and the resulting force threw the boy onto his back. She rested a single foot on top of his torso before he could have a chance to get up. As Ulrich struggled under her foot she mustered up as much muscle power as possible and added pressure until her foot had stabbed through Ulrich’s torso. Anti-Aelita watched emotionlessly as he faded away. “Insignificant.” She sneered. Just as she turned around to take to the skies  again, she was met face to face with another Ulrich.

“See I can’t let you leave.” Ulrich smirked. “I really just wanted to beat you using only one clone and rub it in Odd’s face, but I guess I got careless.” The Ulrich clone drew his sword once again. “That won’t happen again.” He took up a fighting stance. 

Anti-Aelita phased through the surface again, leaving the Ulrich clone all alone. The clone took a step back. “Sneak attack, huh?” He said. “Then I’ll just limit your choices. He backed himself up against a large boulder and grabbed both swords from his back before stabbing them both into the ground in front of him. He continued materializing sword and stabbing them into the ground until he was completely surrounded by at least twenty of them. “Now, unless you want a sword through your skull, you’ll have to be a good girl and fight fair.” 

Suddenly an arm shot out of the rock he had backed himself up against and grabbed his neck. The grip around his neck began to tighten like a vice he could feel another energy field being summoned around his neck. Ulrich desperately grabbed the arm and hoisted Anti-Aelita out of hiding and onto her feet in front of him. “Nice trick.” He said grabbing a hold of two of the hilts below him. He effortlessly pulled them both from the ground and jumped out of his sword trap. “Didn’t know you could phase through the boulders too. But tricks like that don’t work twice.”

Ulrich quickly hurled of the swords he was holding towards Anti-Aelita. He then pulled two more out of the ground and charged forward. Anti-Aelita easily knocked away the airborne swords in opposite directions. She looked up to find Ulrich plummeting towards her with two swords pointed down. She reached her arm up and blocked the two blades with her bare wrist. By the time the two swords cut through her hand, she had already summoned up an energy field and fired it off against Ulrich’s stomach. His swords dropped to the ground and the clone slowly faded away midair. 

Anti-Aelita examined her now hand-less right arm but quickly shrugged it off.

~The Factory~

“You ready, Jeremie?” Yumi asked her hand hovering over the elevator button. 

“I have no idea. Jim’s boot camp helps, but in a fight between me and Sam? Or Patrick? I don’t know how long I’ll be able to last.” Jeremie admitted. 

“Well, time to find out!” Yumi hit the button violently and the doors to the elevator slid open revealing... no one. “What the... I thought you said they were right outside?” 

“They were. They must’ve gone... the supercomputer!” Jeremie called behind him before taking off for the small ladder leading down to the lower levels. He climbed down the ladder quickly but Yumi could still hear his voice echoing. “If they damage the supercomputer while the others are still in there-” 

“Wait for me!” Yumi called following closely behind him. She ran up to the hatch as well only to be cut off by Jeremie flying back up to her level landing near her with a loud thud. “Jeremie!” She knelt down next to him. “Are you okay?!” 

“Forget me! He’s down below!” Yumi nodded and, instead of using the ladder, just jumped through the small hatch dropping her all the way down to the supercomputer room. She immediately saw Peter Duncan tearing wires out of a small opening in the casing of the supercomputer. 

“Hey! Ugly!” She called. Peter Duncan’s head slowly turned towards the young girl. He stared for a moment before returning to his previous task. Yumi narrowed her eyes. She ran forward and tackled Duncan, dragging him across the room. “What are you even doing here?” She questioned. She punched him in the face as hard as she could, then pulled him back up by his collar. “There was only one activated tower!”

Duncan quickly grabbed Yumi’s neck, spun his weight around and pinned the girl up against the wall. He let out a small growl before punching Yumi violently in the stomach. She dropped down to her knees and clutched her abdomen tight. He continued to kick her across the room with a grunt. 

“I could really use some help now Jeremie!” Yumi called up the small hole. 

“I’m a little preoccupied!” Jeremie’s voice called back. Above Yumi and Duncan, Jeremie was locked in combat with both Sam and Patrick. He had just gotten a text out to Odd when his cousin came out of the woodwork to attack him. Sam thrusted her fist forward, but Jeremie ducked under it before side-slamming her back into the open elevator. He slammed the up arrow and before X.A.N.A.- fied Sam could get back up the doors shut on her and the elevator shot upwards with the girl still inside. 

Patrick came after Jeremie next. He rushed forward and lifted his leg up to Jeremie’s line of sight. Knowing he had no chance of overpowering him, Jeremie dove to the right, causing the kick to just narrowly miss him. Jeremie grunted as he landed on the cold factory floor and rammed up against the wall. 

~ Mountain Sector ~

“How are those clones of yours coming?” William called. He was currently on top of one of the three giant drones guarding the activated tower. He had been chipping away at the monster’s armor for the past minute, now only leaving the glass container holding the captive inside. He stabbed his  zweihander into the tube and twisted the sword shattering the glass. “Can you feel them or something?” He tugged the elder man out of the machine and jumped down with him in his arms as the giant exploded behind them. 

“They’re gone.” Ulrich said. He was battling the second drone. The giant fired of its main laser, but Ulrich easily jumped over it. The laser followed Ulrich’s path relentlessly. “They’re basically just weaker versions of me. It makes sense that Anti-Aelita managed to finish them off so quickly.” Ulrich activated his  Supersprint and, in a flash, zipped from his spot, to right beside the drone. His sword easily cut through one of the insect-like legs, causing the offset monster to fall onto its side. 

He attempted to zip away before the drone could react again, but even with the monster off balance, the turret fired up a wide shot that managed to clip Ulrich’s leg. He let out a cry of pain before falling to his knees. The drone warmed up the turret once more as Ulrich lay immobilized. William set the man he’d liberated up against a rock before drawing his sword once again and jumping at the second drone.

As he fell down on top of the drone threatening Ulrich, he skipped the finesse he used on the last one and skipped straight to skewering the pod cleanly, taking out the monster's power source. X.A.N.A.’s monster screeched in pain and William prepared to jump off, but he was immediately shot in the back by another laser. He flew off the monster just as it began exploding, and crashed into the rock next to the liberated pilot. 

From behind the tower the final drone scuttled around into their line of sight, with Aelita trailing behind it, firing off as many energy fields as she could from above the creature. It seemed to ignore her and charged up its main turret, focusing on Ulrich and William, both of whom were still reeling from the respective shots taken at them. 

Aelita gasped and halted her attacks at once. She flew under the monster, moving as fast as she could, and landed in front of the two temporarily defenseless boys and summoned up as big an energy field as she could handle. The pink field started from her palms and steadily grew and grew, wrapping around the three warriors and the other man. The monster’s laser quickly collided with her field, causing Aelita’s entire body to feel the stress of the attack.

Ulrich finally got back to his feet and offered his hand to William, who gripped it firmly and let Ulrich help pull him back to his feet. They both looked to Aelita who was holding back the shot with her force field, but her body was becoming visibly weaker by the second. She slowly refocused the field, wrapping it around the laser itself before giving it one last push. The field successfully repelled the beam back towards the drone. It shot right through the middle of the monster, leaving a gaping hole behind. It collapsed onto the ground and began short circuiting before blowing up in front of the three warriors. 

Aelita dropped to her knees limply and rested her hands on the ground in front of her. Ulrich moved over to her urgently to help her back up. William turned his attention back to the unconscious gentleman he liberated. He knelt down to his level and began shaking him lightly. “Hey! Wake up!”

The man’s eyes opened slowly to the sight of a glaring William. “Who... who are you? Where am I?” He attempted to get up, but William pushed him back down. 

“Don’t even think about it.” William threatened. 

“William! Calm down, man!” Ulrich scolded as he lifted Aelita to her feet. 

“He’s working for X.A.N.A.! I’m not taking any chances! Why are you working for X.A.N.A.?” William questioned. “Are you allied with him, or just a victim?”

“I promise you, I’ve no idea what you’re talking about, you nutcase!” The man panicked. He looked around at the scenery surrounding him. “What is this place?” He asked.

William stood back up slowly and turned to Ulrich and Aelita. “Could be an act. I say we bring him back to Kadic with us.” He suggested. 

“ Uhh ... William?” Aelita said pointing at the rock behind William. When William turned back  around, he saw the last of the man fading away. He’d been devirtualized. 

“No!” William snapped. “How in the-” Before he could say another word, a black and white streak shot up from below the surface, landing a sharp hit on William’s face on her way up. Anti-Aelita rested in the sky above them as William withered away. 

“Go!” Ulrich said letting go of Aelita. “I’ll handle her. You deactivate the tower!” Anti-Aelita raised her left arm up in the air and, corresponding with her movements, a black energy rose and covered up the activated tower. The field melted away, blackening the tower’s once pale walls.

Aelita prepared herself to enter the tower, but unlike usual, ran into what felt like a solid wall. She slammed her face against the tower, knocking her down. She reached forward slowly and rested her hand against the tower. “It’s not working!” She quickly tried with her other hand, to no avail. “It doesn’t recognize me!”

As Ulrich’s sword collided with one of Anti-Aelita's energy fields, he growled at the copy. “This is your doing, isn’t it!?” He accused. Anti-Aelita kicked him down to the ground with as much force as she could muster. 

‘Careful Ulrich. You’ve got five life points left.’ Jeremie’s voice called into his ears. 

“Jeremie! But... what about Sam and Patrick?” Ulrich asked as he defected an energy field from Anti-Aelita.

‘William’s taking care of it.’

~The Factory~

“I don’t have much time.” Jeremie said. He was back in his chair, watching the screen in front of him. As soon as William came back to the real world, he climbed up the ladder, and as soon as he figured out what was going on, tackled Patrick who was in the middle of owning Jeremie. The two of them were currently fighting with each other in the background. “So, if you need something, tell me now. Because I think I hear Sam coming back.”

‘The tower isn’t responding to me!’ Aelita repeated. 

“I see that.” Jeremie commented. “The tower is covered in Anti-Aelita's signature. Being you but also your opposite, it makes sense that, if your power is going into towers, hers could be keeping _you_ _out_.” Jeremie explained. “Defeat Anti-Aelita, and ten bucks says you’ll be able to finish the job.” He recommended. “But be careful, you’re both pretty down on life-points, and it looks like back-up isn’t coming.”

Suddenly Sam’s figure dropped from above them, landing harshly on her knees. If Sam weren’t infected right now, she’d probably be unable to stand. “I have to go.” Jeremie said. “You got this!” He threw the headset onto the keyboard and tackled Sam to the ground before she could get to William. 

“Why aren’t they using any electricity?” William asked, after Kicking Patrick away. 

“That only happens with specters.” Jeremie responded dodging one of Sam’s attacks. “They’re just being affected by whatever X.A.N.A.’s cooked up.”

“And Yumi?” He asked worriedly.

“Downstairs with Duncan.” Jeremie finished right before Sam uppercut him in the chin knocking him into William and both of the boys to the ground. Jeremie groaned and looked up at Sam and Patrick staring down at them with their X.A.N.A. eyes. Sam grabbed Jeremie by the collar and Patrick used both arms to pick William off the ground. 

“They still have that X.A.N.A. strength, though.” William grunted through gritted teeth. 

“They shouldn’t.” Jeremie let out. “They’re not specters-” As Jeremie finished his sentence he felt Sam crush his right arm. He let out a long and loud cry of pain before Sam threw him up against the wall. He smashed his back against one of the protruding pipes and slid down to the floor. He had broken many bones in his life, but this is the first time he knew he had shattered one. His good arm too. He could barely fight before, and now he was completely useless. A couple tears of pain fell from his eyes as Sam slowly approached the wounded boy.

He looked up slowly as the blank stare of his possessed friend looked back. She lifted her shoe above Jeremie’s head, ready to stomp on him any second. She was interrupted as the limp form of Peter Duncan flew into her and forcing the both of them to the ground. Jeremie blinked once and once his eye opened back up, he could see the blurry form of Yumi above him. He smiled slightly before collapsing  onto the floor.

“Jeremie!” Yumi called. “Hey, Einstein! Wake Up!” She pleaded. “We need you!” 

“He probably passed out from the pain!” William grunted punching Patrick in the face. “They crushed his arm like a tortilla chip!” He kicked the boy across the room to get as much distance between the two of them as possible. “What happened to Duncan?”

“I kicked his butt.” She explained propping the unconscious genius up against the wall. “But I can brag later. We need to get these two restrained before-” She was cut off when Sam roundhouse kicked her away. She turned her attention to Jeremie, but felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around to William’s fist moments before it collided with her face. He consecutively hit her twice more, getting her away from Jeremie. 

~The Gymnasium~

Emillie and Odd sat up against the newly built barricade at the foot of the backdoors to the gym, both exhausted from moving everything. Jim was currently looking out the windows, which were the only feasible way in without breaking down the barricades. “Now remember to collapse everything-”

“Pull the table leg, I heard you.” Odd snapped. 

“Did you? I can’t tell when ‘thirty seconds is your limit’.” She spat. “Jackass.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Odd offered.

“About what?” 

“Why you don’t like me. Why we’re not friends. I get it, I’m obnoxious, not something I can help, but that can’t be enough for you to hate me. I always noticed you had more conviction in your voice when you made jabs at me, but to say we’re not even friends?” Odd asked. “Why?”

“You cheated on me with one of my best friends. Kind of a scumbag move.” Emillie snarked angrily.

“I admit, it was not my brightest moment...” Odd said somberly. “... but I apologized more times than I can count. We dated for two weeks and barely ever talked to each other before then. The relationship couldn’t have meant _that_ much to you.” He reasoned. “All the good I do and you decide to boil me down to a stupid mistake?”

“Am I not allowed to have an opinion of you?” Emillie asked. 

“You are. And if that’s it. So be it. We’ll be nothing more than acquaintances. And once X.A.N.A.’s gone; you never have to talk to me again.” He promised raising his right hand. “ But, whether you like it or not, I know you pretty well. Well enough to know that when you lie, you twirl your hair.” He pointed to her finger, wrapped in a spiral of hair. She quickly took it out and set her hand on the ground.

“You think you know me, huh?” Emillie asked.

“Yeah. I do.” He said confidently. “And you’re too logical to hate me on that one mistake. So, I just want to know the real reason.” He finished. “It’s not like you can go anywhere right now, so why not let me know?”

“Why do you care?!” She snapped. 

“Because I thought we were cool, now. But we aren’t. And that doesn’t sit well with me.” Odd said honestly. The two just stared at each other for a moment. Emillie then sunk her head down. In any other situation she could’ve run away from this. But of course, X.A.N.A. hat to ruin her out.

“Fine.” Emillie finally said. “... the reason I hate you is... I envy you. I envy everyone like you.” She said. As soon as Odd noticed both hands on the floor next to her he sat forward slightly. 

“My good looks? My impeccable taste in media? My charming sense of humor?” He prodded with a smile.

“That.” She said immediately.

“My sense of humor?”

“No, you idiot. No matter what, you’re so... carefree. You’ve been fighting a virtual war for years, your love life includes heaps of girls, yet somehow, you’ve managed to leave them all with negative feelings about you, you’re constantly on the verge of being flunked out and you... make jokes. You don’t care. I want that.” She said sadly wrapping her arms around her knees. “It’s something I’ve always wanted.  So when I see people like you, people who don’t get stressed, I start to resent them.”

Odd tilted his head to the left. Emillie looked up at him expectantly. He stared back at her before snapping to his senses. “Oh... you’re done? That’s it? I thought that was just like a prologue.” 

She reached up and smacked him upside the head harshly. “You jerk! I’m trying to open up here! Could you show a little sympathy?!”

Odd rubbed the sore spot on his head gently. “I didn’t mean anything by it, honest. It’s just that... you know... if you want to live carefree, then do it.” He shrugged. “You’re overthinking it. It’s not a trait, it’s a state of mind.” He said pointing to his oversized forehead. 

“For as long as I can remember I’ve been this way. What if I can’t?” Emillie responded. 

“If ifs and buts were candies and nuts, we’d all have a merry Christmas.” He said dismissing her. “Look at Jeremie and Aelita, they're the two smartest kids in school, and they’re just as involved in our shenanigans as anyone else. You literally have to do one thing only. Stop. Caring.” Odd explained. 

“But-”

“No wonder you’re always so stressed. No one ever taught you how to let loose.” He joked. He put a hand on her shoulder. “But I guess I never did really make amends for that whole cheating situation, so as a favor, I’ll tutor you.” He said with a smile.

“Really? You’d do that?”

“Of course! Blowing off responsibilities is my _specialty_! And soon, it’ll be yours, too!”

“I can’t see anyone outside for the moment.” Jim said approaching the two of them slowly. “I think we’re safe for now. Any word from your friends?” 

Odd and Emillie both pulled out their cellular phones. “I got a text from Jeremie!” Odd said. He opened up his phone and examined the message. “He says that before Aelita was infected, she smelled rust.” Odd reported. 

"Just like Patrick." Emillie added.

“So that means that whatever this is, is spreading through people’s sense of smell.” Jim said rubbing the bottom of his chin. 

“And that’s why Pat and Sam were breathing on Aelita to infect her. But she must’ve snapped out of it to give a testimony.” Odd said.

“Of course!” Why didn’t I think of it earlier?!” Emillie exclaimed. 

“What do-” Jim was interrupted by a thunderous banging on the wall. The three of them rushed to the window to see a small mob of infected banging against the walls. Emillie rushed to the doors leading to the rest of the building and started tearing it down and throwing the pieces behind  her...

“You guys take this stuff and board the windows with it!” Emillie shouted. “I’m going outside to lead as many of those things away as I can!” She pulled he mixing board away from the door and opened it up slightly. Seeing no one running around she set a foot outside the gymnasium, but felt a hand holding her back. 

Odd tightened his grip. “Going out there is pointless. You just become one of them.”

“No, I won’t. I don’t have a sense of smell! I can lead them away and get to the factory!” She shook off his hand and slammed the door behind her before Odd could say another word. Odd quickly pushed everything back in place, deciding he had no choice.

Jim was loading a bunch of miscellaneous items into the windowsill as fast as he could, and Odd quickly joined him. They caught a quick glance of Emillie punching Laura in the face kicking over Heidi. With X.A.N.A.’s attention on her she took off into the timber. Jim contently put the last bit into the window. 

Emillie had a simple plan. Lead them into the forest, ditch them, get to the factory and help out Aelita’s team who undoubtedly ran into problems if it’s taking this long.

As she dodged the many trees in front of her she caught the manhole out of the corner of her eye. She took a quick look behind her and noticed quite a few of them still on her tail. She randomized her route hoping to confuse the bunch and made mental notes of each turn she took. As the number behind her dwindled, she looped back around, and started making her way back to the manhole.

~The Factory~

Patrick’s head slammed against the factory floor harshly, his limbs falling beside him. Yumi quickly grabbed the boy off the floor and slung him over her shoulder. She turned around to find Sam staring her down, but before Sam could do anything, William managed to knock her out from behind, and caught the girl as she fell, too. 

“Thanks.” Yumi breathed. “Not like I’m complaining but, was that, a little too easy?” She questioned William. “It’s like X.A.N.A.’s puppets weren’t as strong this time around.” 

“Maybe the fact that he used two towers last time, means he’s weaker this time?” William guessed. “Doesn’t matter. Point is we subdued the three of them... now where do we put them?” 

“There’s no where we can lock them up, that they wouldn’t cause irreversible damage.” Yumi said. “Our best bet is to drag the three of them back upstairs. If they wake up, at least we’ll have more room to fight.” She reasoned.

“You’re the boss.” William shrugged. “What about Jeremie?”

“He’d be safer down here anyway.” Yumi said. Yumi grabbed Sam out of his arms and gestured towards Duncan. But when she turned around, the elevator was gone. “Uhh... William, where’s the elevator?”

William dropped Duncan back to the ground and turned to face the posterior of the room. “It’s gone. Someone must’ve activated it while we were fighting...” He sighed in defeat. “So, another one’s coming?”

“Probably.” Yumi said. “Get ready, I want you to subdue them the second that door opens.” Yumi ordered. “I’ll guard these three.” She violently nudged Duncan to the other side of the room with her foot, before gently setting her two friends on top of him.

“You got it.” William said cracking his knuckles. As the elevator came to a stop, William rook up a fighting stance. The doors slowly opened and he braced himself for a league of X.A.N.A. minions. As soon as he identified that there was only one figure inside, his fighting instincts took over and he dove in between the still moving elevator doors, to tackle whoever was inside. 

“William!” A familiar voice shrieked. “It’s me!” William released a little pressure and opened his eyes, which immediately met with Emillie’s angry glare. “Let me go!”

“Not a chance! How dumb do you think I am X.A.N.A.!?” William shot back heatedly.

“Not you too...” She groaned. “Look, by the looks of this place, you need all the help you can get, so just virtualize me already before you screw us over!” She demanded raising her voice.

William quickly loosened his grip. He grabbed both of her arms and pulled her back to her feet. “Okay, that’s you. But Jeremie’s out like a light and we have no idea how to do that.” He told her. 

“Emillie get in the scanner!” Yumi ordered. Emillie nodded eagerly and left without another word. “Yumi got into the computer chair and donned Jeremie’s personal headset. “Aelita! Can you hear me? How are you guys doing?”

‘Not good. With so little life points we can’t afford to rush this one. She’s not leaving a single opening either. I’m afraid we might be a while.’ Her voice responded. 

“Backup’s on the way. But I need to know how to virtualize someone.” Yumi responded. 

‘It’s easy.’ Aelita promised. ‘The computer should already be locked on the drop-point we used earlier so all you have to do is the virtualization  process .’

~Lyoko~

~Mountain Sector~

Ulrich leaped from one small floating platform to the next, only making it thanks to his increased speed, with Anti-Aelita soaring close behind him. He looked behind him quickly to gauge the distance. As he jumped to the next boulder, he spun around and threw his sword at Anti-Aelita. She barrel-rolled to the left and the sword launched deep into the digital-sea. Anti-Aelita launched an energy field at Ulrich’s feet, forcing him to jump back to the main platform. Just as it looked as if he was going to make it, he missed the landing by a few inches. He instantly stabbed his sword into the side of floating platform. His sword was now the only thing keeping him from falling into the Digital Sea. 

“Don’t look down. Don’t look down. Don’t look down.” He repeated fighting back the insurmountable urge to check below him. He materialized another sword in his other hand and stabbed it parallel to the other. He looked up to see the blank eyes of Anti-Aelita looking down on him. He gave her a cocky smirk. “Don’t look down on me,  you soulless freak.” He growled.

“Ulrich!” He heard Aelita call out.

“Stay back!” Ulrich responded. “One hit to either of us and we’re done! Better me than you!” He cried. 

Against his orders, Aelita took to the sky. She  dove towards her doppelganger and threw as many energy fields as she could muster. Anti-Aelita looked over her shoulder slightly noticing the oncoming attack. She created a small force field around her back that absorbed the oncoming shots. The field then shot out, heading straight towards Aelita. She was too close to dodge it and the resulting blowing knocked her away, grounding her once more. “Aelita! You okay?!” No answer. 

Anti-Aelita turned back to Ulrich who was still giving her  an angry glance. “Do it.” He urged. “I _dare_ you.” Anti-Aelita stared at him for a moment before summoning up another attack. She launched it at one of Ulrich’s swords destroying it on contact. Ulrich watched as she readied another shot and pointed her arm down at his sword. “You want to throw me into the Digital Sea? Well, then do it, you coward!” 

“Die.” She shot off her final shot and Ulrich’s sword blew away in pieces. He felt his hand slip off the surface as he plummeted to his demise. She turned her attention to Aelita, but the girl was nowhere to be found. She turned back to where Ulrich had fallen and examined her surroundings, scanning for Aelita. Suddenly, with a flap of her pink wings, Aelita ascended above Anti-Aelita from below the surface, holding Ulrich underhandedly firmly by the pits of his arms. She did a single twirl and launched Ulrich into Anti-Aelita.

Ulrich tackled the girl to the ground, landing on top of her, and before she could move again, stabbed one of his swords through her right leg, nailing her to the ground. She didn't even react. “Pretty good bluff about the only  one shot left thing huh? You’re pretty dumb for a program.” He proceeded to slice off her only remaining hand and raised his sword above his head, tip pointed down. She looked to her left to see Aelita, energy fields in hand, looking down at her too. As Ulrich plunged his sword downward, Anti-Aelita melted into the ground, and all Ulrich ended up hitting was solid rock. “I hate when she does that!”

Anti-Aelita reappeared behind them and kicked Ulrich in the back forcing his virtual body to go airborne. Aelita rushed to catch him once again but he’d  devirtualized before she could get to him. Apparently, he really did only have one shot left in him. Aelita watched as Anti-Aelita approached her. She shot forward and nailed Aelita to the still blocked off tower with just a single foot. As she held Aelita there single-footedly, she began pushing more and more pressure onto Aelita’s chest. Aelita cringed in pain, but just before Anti-Aelita could finish the job, a yellow rope wrapped around her neck and most of the pressure released. Aelita opened her eyes once again, and Emillie was standing at a distance, pulling Anti-Aelita back with her lasso.

“Sorry I’m late.” She grunted. Anti-Aelita turned struggled with the lasso, trying to get her sharp  wings into the right position to cut the rope since her hands were gone. “And I hate to be bossy, but could you please kill this thing while I still have it?!” She pleaded. 

Aelita snapped out of it and mustered one last ball of energy, containing every bit of power she felt like she had left, into her palm, and rushed forward. Before Anti-Aelita could free herself, Aelita thrusted her arm straight through Anti-Aelita's torso. She fell to her knees in exhaustion and watched as the small hole he  attack had left behind grew bigger and bigger, until Anti-Aelita, still as stoic as ever, fully faded away.

“Guessing this one wasn’t a walk in the park like we had hoped, huh?” Emillie said as she wrapped one of Aelita’s arms around her shoulder. The dark essence that had surrounded the tower was fading now too. “Let’s deactivate that tower.”

“How’d you get here? Ulrich said they got you.” She breathed heavily.

“No sense of smell. I guess X.A.N.A. didn’t account for that, huh?” Emillie smiled. She softly pushed Aelita into the tower, and dismissed her lasso. “She’s in, Yumi. Bring me home.” Emillie called. 

‘Good to hear. Because they’re waking up.’ Yumi’s voice responded. 

Emillie could feel herself going numb and looked to her hands which were already practically gone along with her feet. The feeling spread throughout her entire body until she was no more. Inside the activated tower Aelita pressed her hand up against the small monitor in front of her. After verifying her identity, she saw the words ‘Code:  Lyoko ’ spawn across the screen. She looked around her as the seemingly infinite amount of code fell to the lower levels. “Yumi?” Yumi had already started the  devirtualization process on her. 

~The Factory~

The doors to scanner one opened up quickly, and Aelita shakily stepped out of the machine, stumbling to the right slightly. She looked up expecting to see Emillie or someone waiting for her, but no one was there. Which meant something went wrong. She quickly regained her composure, and made her way towards the ladder leading up to the computer room. As she climbed, she began hearing Yumi, William, and Emillie’s voices, but not Jeremie’s,  She peaked her head out of the hole. “Is everything okay, guys?” She immediately noticed Emillie on the ground watching over Sam and Patrick who were both beaten up pretty bad, William was tying up Peter Duncan with a bunch of the wires he had removed from the supercomputer during his fight with Yumi, and Yumi herself was tending to- “Jeremie!” She called she hopped over Sam and Patrick gracefully and landed on top of Duncan’s back, before dropping to her knees next to Yumi. “What happened?!”

“He’ll be fine.” Yumi said trying to calm her. “He’s just passed out. He’s not used to taking blows from X.A.N.A. like we are. His right arm is shattered for sure, but a return trip should fix that.” Aelita nodded understandingly and got back to her feet and rushed into the computer chair. 

“I’m launching the return trip now.” Aelita announced. She hit the enter key and bright light emanated from the supercomputer. The light spread across the room engulfing Aelita, then Yumi and Jeremie and then reaching the rest of the group.

Over at the school, Odd and Jim were both holding back a horde of mindless students and teachers. Both of them had their hands up against the door, in support of the barricade. “I can’t keep this up!” Odd yelled. “My arms are gonna fall off!”

Jim looked over his shoulder and saw the bright light reflecting through the windows. “I’d be more worried about that light!” Jim cried. “What the heck is that?”

“Light?” Odd asked excitedly. He turned around and immediately recognized it. “They did it!” He cheered pumping his fists in the air. Upon letting go of the door, the army outside managed to break through the barrier, knocking Odd and Jim onto their backs.

“What do we do now?” Jim panicked propping himself back up.

Odd rested his hands under his head and crossed his legs into a relaxed position. “Just let it happen.” He smiled. The light managed to reach the two of them before any of the zombies did.

~Kadic Academy~

~12:00 P.M.~

The nine  Lyoko warriors stood outside the cafeteria together. Odd, Ulrich, Aelita, Jeremie, and Sam were sitting on the steps, William and Emillie were on the ground next to them, and Yumi and Patrick were standing in front of the rest of them. Odd was the only one still eating. The rest had rushed it to discuss Jim. “That’s twice we’ve made the poor guy lose his job.” Yumi commented. “You sure you want to bring him on board?”

“Not on board.” Jeremie retorted. “But he should know. The return trip may have erased the current events in his mind, but the deeper memories of X.A.N.A. have already resurfaced in his mind. We have no idea if they can be repressed again.”

“And if what he told you guys is true,” Aelita continued. “And he really was a close friend to my father, it’s only right that I honor that friendship.”

“ So we put it to a vote?” William asked.

“A vote? A vote on what?” Another voice called. They turned to see Sissi and Laura standing before them with expectant looks on their faces. 

“Oh.” Yumi said detached. “It’s you guys. Where’re dumb and dumber?”

“Buying us some snacks. What’re you going to vote on. You know I’m a huge fan of democracy.” Sissi boasted. 

“Not really any of your business-” Yumi started before Odd outstretched his arm stopping her mid-sentence.

Odd swallowed his food happily and shook his head. “Now, Yumi, honesty is the best policy. This involves them too, after all.” He said cheerily. “We were just trying to decide which one of you looks more like Don Knotts.”

“What?!” Sissi snapped. The group of nine started laughing uncontrollably. “How dare you?!”

“I know!” Odd responded. “It’s hard being this  ambitious, but we’re determined to figure it out! It’s _really_ close, though.” Laura let out a loud ‘ hmph ’ before turning around and stomping away, with Sissi following suit as soon as she managed to snap out of her anger.

“Where do come up with this stuff?” Sam asked still giggling. “That was brilliant!”

“You mean to tell me you _don’t_ think Sissi looks like Don Knotts? Huh.” He shrugged before turning back to his food. He stabbed a meatball with his fork and shoved it into his mouth. “Guess it’s just me.”

A loud whistle call caught the attention of all the warriors. “Della Robia!” Jim’s voice boomed. Jim marched over to the group in an intimidating matter. “You know the rules!” He said. “Food and cafeteria supplies stay inside the cafeteria!”

“But I’m just on the step!” Odd argued.

“I’ve got no choice. You’re going to see Delmas.” Jim said crossing his arms. “And the rest of you didn’t try to stop despite knowing the rules... so you guys go, too.” He ordered.

“Seriously?!” Ulrich snapped. “You’re overreacting, Jim!” He fought. “We can’t control Odd! He’s the closest thing to a wild animal this school has!”

“Enough!” Jim boomed once more. “All of you are coming with me!” The nine warriors dejectedly followed Jim into the building as the rest of their classmates watch in a mixture of reactions. Jim held the door open, and keeping in a single file line, they shuffled in. He led them down a hallway before stopping next to the teacher’s lounge. He opened the door slightly and peeked his head in. Seeing no one else in there, he gestured towards the door. 

Once everyone was inside, he turned around and locked the door. “So, how’d the interview go?” He asked happily turning towards Aelita.

Aelita was a bit taken aback by both the question and his change of tone, but figured it’d be best to just answer. “...Fine?” Aelita said warily. “...They want to see me again after I graduate.”

“That’s great! What about... you know... him?” Jim continued. 

They all looked at each other for a moment. “You remember it all?” Emillie asked. “We did go back in time, right?” She asked turning to Jeremie. 

“It’s Friday. We went back in time alright.” Jeremie confirmed. “But it seems that Jim’s somehow had his memory spared.”

“Yeah, it was the weirdest thing. I woke up with more memories of X.A.N.A. than I had before. In fact, there aren’t any holes in my memory that I can find anymore.” Jim explained. “I figured you guys would know what happened.”

“Well...” Jeremie said scratching his chin. “...it’s possible that by regaining all your memories from the previous timelines, you’ve somehow grown an immunity. The return trip brought back your body, but your mind’s been untouched.” He theorized. “But we’ll really only know for sure if we launch another return.”

“That makes our vote on whether he should join us a lot easier.” Patrick said. “We’d be stupid not to take his help, if he’s immune.”

“Help? What are you guys talking about?” Jim said. “I can’t help you kids.”

“What?” Odd asked confused. “I thought you’d jump at the chance.” 

“Look, I’m flattered but... you guys are the heroes here. I’m just not built for this kind of stuff anymore.” Jim said.

“What do you mean, ‘ _anymore_ ’?” Aelita asked looking him straight in the eyes. 

“...I’d rather not talk about it.” He responded dismissively. “Anyways, I need to finish my own mission. I’m a teacher before anything. Your teacher.” He clarified. “And a professional educator such as myself should report this kind of thing to the principle at once.” He watched as everyone’s faces fell and Jeremie put a hand on Aelita’s shoulder. He let out a deep sigh. “ But, I can’t deny the fact that we might have been long gone years ago without what you kids do so, I suppose if you snuck away while I wasn’t looking, there’d be nothing for me to do, huh?”

“You mean it!?” Aelita asked, face lighting up. “You won’t report us to Delmas?!”

“That’s _Principle_ Delmas!” Jim snapped. They all stared at him shocked. “...Sorry. Force of habit. The way I see it, if I report you, we lose the only people qualified to handle X.A.N.A.” Jim said. “So, I’ll you kids do what you do, and meanwhile, I’ll keep an eye on things around campus.” 

“There’s actually one more thing you should know, Jim.” Jeremie said. He plopped his bag onto one of the lounge’s many tables and pulled out his laptop. Upon opening it he pulled up to photos and enhanced the imaging for the rest of the gang to see. “These are implants. We’ve been finding them inside people X.A.N.A. has used in the past. They give him the power to control someone for a short while, without activating a tower.”

“Duncan.” Yumi realized. 

“Exactly. And not just him. There was one in William. And me. And unfortunately, there’s one in you too, Jim.” Jeremie said. “At any point X.A.N.A. could take control of you. There’s nothing we can do about it. And it’s probably a phenomenon affecting the entire school.”

“So, I’m like a sleeper agent?” Jim said. “Why doesn’t he activate it now?” Jim asked. “Wouldn’t it make sense to just have me attacking you twenty-four seven?”

“That’s the good news. The residue isn’t strong. Actually, it’s incredibly weak. Remember when I scanned you? Before in my room?” Jim nodded. “I was searching for the implant. I found it, and preserved the data on the supercomputer as well as my laptop. From what I discovered, X.A.N.A. can only utilize these implants once.” Jeremie explained.

“How can you tell?” William asked. 

“Because, that-” Jeremie said pointing to the implant on his laptop screen. “is what Jim’s implant looks like right now,” He hit the enter key on his computer and brought up another diagram. It was the same implant, but it wasn’t showing the same energy levels and had grown shriveled and smaller. “That’s mine. And William’s looks even more deteriorated. Because X.A.N.A.’s already used the two of us.”

"He's used me? When?" William gawked. "What did he do?!"

"No way to tell. Could've been anything, but there isn't enough energy left in it for it to be used again." Jeremie assured. 

“So, what does this mean for me?” Jim asked. “Can you remove it?”

“I’m a computer nerd, not a brain surgeon.” Jeremie deadpanned. “I haven’t found a neutralization method yet, so while you’re watching the campus, we’ll have to watch you, too.” He explained shutting his computer. “Hopefully, with X.A.N.A.’s attack over, I’ll have some downtime to research it more.” 

“Well, if X.A.N.A. does take control of me, don’t hold back.” Jim said seriously. “Don’t hesitate to use everything I’ve taught you up until this point.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Jeremie affirmed. Jim peaked his head back into the hallway looking for anyone. He gestured for the students to make their way out of the teachers' lounge. He locked the door behind him and faced the group one last time. 

“By the way,” Jim said. “When X.A.N.A. isn’t attacking, I expect you all to go to class and at least _try_ to uphold the same standards as everyone else. Because if you break the rules, it’d be unfair of me to pardon you.” He waved once before walking away. 

“Even if we’re saving the world?!” Odd whined.

“Even if.” Jim called back. 

“Speaking of which, we’ve got to go.” William said stretching his arms out. “We’ve got our Ancient History class in ten minutes. Which is good because I really need a nap.” He stuck his hands into his pockets and walked down the hallway. 

Yumi leaned over and pecked Ulrich on the cheek. “I’ll see you tonight.” She promised. “Seven. Don’t forget.” She pressed. She slung her bag over her shoulder and rushed after William. 

“Shouldn’t you be going too?” Odd looking up at Sam. “It’s your class, too”

“I don’t know. I feel like I’d almost learn _more_ just goofing off with you for an hour.” She smiled. “Who needs to know about stuff that happened so long ago anyway?”

“You weren’t listening when Jim was talking, were you?” Jeremie asked, already fully aware of the answer. “He can’t go easy on us, even if we’re fighting X.A.N.A.”

“Yeah I tuned out about halfway through.” Sam admitted shamelessly. “I was debating whether to go to class or not.” She said with a smirk on her face. “And I’ve decided-”

Yumi appeared behind her and pushed her further down the hall. “Come on, Sam. You can’t get away with skipping another class.” She said. 

“Where’d you come from!?”

“I had a feeling you wouldn’t want to come to class, so William said he’d stall the teacher while I looped around to pick you up.” Yumi smiled. “If I had come from the front, you would’ve run away.”

“What is you guys’ aversion to skipping class every now and then?!” She snapped. As the two of them continued to argue down the hallway, the remaining six students stared in amusement. 

“Ten bucks says she slips away from Yumi before they get there.” Ulrich bet. 

“Twenty says she stays, but swears at the teacher at least twice.” Odd challenged. Ulrich nodded and shook Odd’s hand excitedly. 

Emillie approached Odd slowly. “So, I can’t believe I’m actually doing this,  but can you show me that whole letting loose thing?” She asked. “I’m not really sure where to start.”

“Sure! But you have to call me _Sensei_.” Odd said cheekily.

Emillie cringed. She regretted this already. “Fine.” She agreed reluctantly. “...Odd-Sensei.”

Odd smiled. “It’s easy. What’s stressing you out right now?” He asked eagerly. “Then watch the master at work.”

“Well Laura of all people just kicked me out of the Big Ten and my parents are going to freak out when they hear about it, not to mention that lit test that we were given no information on! I’m basically going to have to study the entire book-”

Odd held up a hand to silence her. “Okay. First off, the Big Ten? Really? Only prudes are on that list! You don’t want to be anywhere near it.” He suddenly heard Jeremie clear his throat from behind him. He saw both him and Aelita glaring at him intensely. He turned back to Emillie. “Like I said.” He deadpanned. “Your parents? Forget about it. These are your rebellion years anyway. And that test? Don’t study for it at all! For example, Ulrich” He said wrapping an arm around Ulrich’s shoulder. “Patrick,” He wrapped his other around Patrick’s. “and I all have the same test. But we’re going to go check out the arcade machines they just installed in the wreck room, instead. Then tonight, Ulrich and I are going on a  double date to the movies.”

“You’re not going to study at all?” Emillie asked. “The test is tomorrow!”

“We work hard!” Patrick whined. “If anyone deserves to goof off and cut their study sessions, it’s us!”

“You’re welcome to come check out the arcade machines with us.” Ulrich offered. “We heard they got all the retro classics.”

“But-”

“Trust in Odd-Sensei.” Odd interrupted. “This is letting go. Once you’ve blown off a test or two, you can go right back to being obsessive. But until then, I promised to show you the way.” He released his arms and gave Emillie a respectful bow.

“I guess.” She relented. Aelita and Jeremie watched as Patrick and Odd rushed Emillie down the hallway. Ulrich turned around and gave a questioning glance to them. 

“We’re good.” Aelita told him. Next to her, Jeremie nodded. “You guys have fun.” Ulrich shrugged and rushed after Odd, Patrick, and Emillie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this X.A.N.A. attack wasn't very original, but in my defense, and I didn't realize this until after I started this story, X.A.N.A. attacks are hard to write, not from a creativity standpoint, from a standpoint of I can't think mayn things X.A.N.A. hasn't done before.


End file.
